S. Korean airline crash

Seattle

Seattle

Valued Senior Member
That is a hard video to watch. The pilot manages a smooth "successful" landing and then a few seconds later 177 people die instantly as it runs into a reinforced cement wall "protecting" the ILS antennas.

Hopefully a directive will go out and airports around the world will make sure that they don't have any structures like that anywhere near the runways. In this case the plane was going so fast that it was only a few yards away from the cinder block airport perimeter wall. That could have killed everyone as well but it also was more likely to break apart (compared to a reinforced cement structure).

Maybe all perimeter walls near the end of runways will be rebuilt with this in mind as well.

It will be interesting to learn why the landing gear was manually lowered (no time?). It appears that the bird strike (if that is what happened) damaged the hydraulic system since the gear and flaps weren't down. This was the second attempt at landing and I think (not positive) that the gear was down on the first attempt. It looks like the one good engine may have died on the second attempt thus killing the hydraulics, landing gear and flaps and limited the pilots time to react.
 
I'm guessing that when all is said and done, this is going to turn out to be more due to pilot error than any other factor.
 
It's early days yet. Most major aircraft accidents these days require the coincidence of several different factors that lead to a tragic outcome.

There's very little information available about this incident at this time. It's impossible to rule out factors such as maintenance issues.
 
It's impossible to rule out anything of course.

It's looking like pilot error, IMO, just because the ultimate problem here was trying to land that fast if it wasn't unavoidable and landing without flaps or landing gear is only unavoidable under very limited circumstances and that speed was what really caused the loss of life.

The reinforced concrete structure didn't help of course and was the immediate cause of death but had that not been there, they were still going way too fast and there was still the airport perimeter wall just a few yards beyond that.

They couldn't brake because the gear wasn't down, they had no additional drag because the gear wasn't down nor were the flaps deployed and they weren't able to land at the far end of the runway because of the high speed that was required to stay airborne since there wasn't that drag. When you now look at the actually video footage at actual speed and not slowed down, the speed of the airplane is "extreme". It's hard to survive that unless you are on the Bonneville Salt Flats or some unlimited flat surface.

Plus on the second attempt they turned around and now tried to land with the wind at their back thus increasing the ground speed even more.

It's pretty much a case that either both engines failed or it was pilot error. I'm just saying that it's looking more likely now that it was pilot error. Nothing is for sure of course.
 

There is a mention of a bird strike in the video plus hydraulics failure in the comments section.

Terrible.
 
Pinball1970 said:

There is a mention of a bird strike in the video plus hydraulics failure in the comments section.

Terrible.
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Yeah, there was a bird strike but it would take more than that to have these results. I have a pilots license but not for these kinds of airplanes. I just mention it to say that this is an area I have some interest in and some knowledge about.

They may have made a mistake and shut down the wrong engine and therefore had no engines or they may have forgotten to lower the gear after being fixated on that final "loop" to get back to the end of the runway (now going in the opposite ...down wind .. direction) or several other "errors" but it would take a lot for it to just be something totally unavoidable under these circumstances, IMO.
 
Seattle said:
Yeah, there was a bird strike but it would take more than that to have these results. I have a pilots license but not for these kinds of airplanes. I just mention it to say that this is an area I have some interest in and some knowledge about.

They may have made a mistake and shut down the wrong engine and therefore had no engines or they may have forgotten to lower the gear after being fixated on that final "loop" to get back to the end of the runway (now going in the opposite ...down wind .. direction) or several other "errors" but it would take a lot for it to just be something totally unavoidable under these circumstances, IMO.
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I have no experience of any of this, just those analysis videos which I really should not watch.
Terrified of flying and did a lot of it for work pre COVID. That has stopped now luckily.
 
Pinball1970 said:
I have no experience of any of this, just those analysis videos which I really should not watch.
Terrified of flying and did a lot of it for work pre COVID. That has stopped now luckily.
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You probably just don't like the feeling of not being in control. I don't particularly like the sardine can like feeling but if the plane was empty I'd like that.:)

Anyway, statistically it's very safe but the problem with airline crashes is that when they do happen it's usually pretty dramatic. I think I heard that in 2023 there were no casualties.
 
Pinball1970 said:
I have no experience of any of this, just those analysis videos which I really should not watch.
Terrified of flying and did a lot of it for work pre COVID. That has stopped now luckily.
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Flying doesn't bother me at all, but being in airports--especially past the security checkpoints--stresses me out. Whenever I'm prohibited from going outside, I can't handle it. Obviously, space travel is not for me.
 
The
Seattle said:
You probably just don't like the feeling of not being in control. I don't particularly like the sardine can like feeling but if the plane was empty I'd like that.:)

Anyway, statistically it's very safe but the problem with airline crashes is that when they do happen it's usually pretty dramatic. I think I heard that in 2023 there were no casualties.
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Low, except for https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yeti_Airlines_Flight_691
 
Seattle said:
You probably just don't like the feeling of not being in control. I don't particularly like the sardine can like feeling but if the plane was empty I'd like that.:)

Anyway, statistically it's very safe but the problem with airline crashes is that when they do happen it's usually pretty dramatic. I think I heard that in 2023 there were no casualties.
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I don't know. I never liked the idea of it and like you said if it goes wrong everyone dies in crumpled metal fireball.

Cuts and bruises in a 40 mph crash in a car with an air bag. At 33,000 feet? Everyone dies. Crash into the ground or mountain? Everyone dies. Hydraulics fail BUT you land pretty plum but cannot stop and crash into the concrete antenna tower? Fireball and everyone dies. Sometimes a lunatic decides to fly a plane into a building and you're in it? Rare yes but who cares?
It is a 100% certainty when you happen to be on it.

Love to the friends and family of those people that's all I can say. If I can avoid it going forward I will.

There will be positive messages from me on this site today, not just my phobia!
 
Seattle said:
. . . they weren't able to land at the far end of the runway because of the high speed that was required to stay airborne since there wasn't that drag.
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They could have landed at the far end of the runway, flaps or no flaps. However, it is likely that the greater groundspeed (due to the lack of flaps and downwind landing) gave them a sight picture they were not used to, and so landed long.

Hopefully a directive will go out and airports around the world will make sure that they don't have any structures like that anywhere near the runways.
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Not really possible. At Chicago-Midway, for example, both runways start and end a few yards from roads. Same with San Diego. At many other airports the runways are elevated, or are near bridges or buildings, or have the terminal on the other side.

If any space IS available, filling that space with EMAS (google it) will help - although it is designed for the much higher loadings (per square foot) that landing gear give you, not the lesser loadings that a belly landing give you. But it will still be far better than concrete when it comes to arresting aircraft.
 
billvon said:
They could have landed at the far end of the runway, flaps or no flaps. However, it is likely that the greater groundspeed (due to the lack of flaps and downwind landing) gave them a sight picture they were not used to, and so landed long.



Not really possible. At Chicago-Midway, for example, both runways start and end a few yards from roads. Same with San Diego. At many other airports the runways are elevated, or are near bridges or buildings, or have the terminal on the other side.

If any space IS available, filling that space with EMAS (google it) will help - although it is designed for the much higher loadings (per square foot) that landing gear give you, not the lesser loadings that a belly landing give you. But it will still be far better than concrete when it comes to arresting aircraft.
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It's likely that the higher speed along with ground effect and especially if both engines were disabled that this was the reason that it floated for so long.
 
Pilot error imo.
On first atempt at landing on runway 01 why wasnt the landing gear down?
Even if bird strike killed one engine plane can still fly on other one as seen after.
Why did pilot turn left to go around instead of going straight and Then do normal circuit and try 01 again,no bariers at that end.
Even if hydraulics failed the Gear can be lowered manualy,just take more time.
Pilots shoulve take their time and THINK instead of rushing to land.
Btw
Malaysian flight 370 way back was murder suicide by Captain
see Green Dot Aviation

 
While on subject of airplanes
if you like good story listen to
Frederick Forsythe the Sheperd on YT
 
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