Update: According to USA Today, the plane crash has killed 179 people with only two survivors. The flight was carrying 175 passengers and six crew members. Original story below.
A routine flight ended in tragedy when a plane carrying 175 passengers skidded off a runway. The tragic incident happened at a South Korean airport. The plane crashed after exiting the runway and went up in a ball of fire. The resulting incident killed at least 47 people and injured others.
A Jeju Air Boeing 737-800 airplane had reached its final destination after leaving Thailand's Muan International Airport. Sadly, it's landing gear failed to engage, causing the plane to skid across the runway. It careened out of control and exploded in a mass of flames, according to New York Post.
First responders immediately arrived at the scene. They placed more of their focus on attempting to rescue passengers at the tail end of the plane. "After the plane collided with the wall, passengers were thrown out of the aircraft. The chances of survival (were) extremely low," Muan fire chief Lee Jeong-hyeon said in a briefing translated by Yonhap news agency. "The aircraft has almost completely been destroyed, and it is difficult to identify the deceased. We are in the process of recovering the remains, which will take time."
Plane Crashes While At Airport
The flight was carrying 175 passengers, most of which were South Korean nationals except for two Thai nationals. It took around 80 firefighters to put out the resulting inferno. They also began to assist passengers and rescue them from the plane. The terrifying video posted on X showed the plane crash.
The lack of landing gear called the flight to fall on its belly. Sparks and smoke immediately began flying around from the aircraft. It then ended up crashing and exploding. It was a chaotic scene and just the latest tragedy involving an aircraft. Prior to crashing, the flight had attempted one landing before.
However, it couldn't complete the landing. Its landing gear failed to engage. So it had to perform a go-around maneuver. A go-around maneuver involves aborting a landing, circling back around, and trying again. However, the second attempt at the landing proved to be a failure as well. Sadly, it also proved to be a very deadly one.
There are several questions around the crash, but the chief among them involves the landing gear. What caused it to fail to engage. Theories suggest a bird strike may have caused a malfunction that resulted in the tragedy.
