MUAN, South Korea — A catastrophic aviation disaster unfolded Sunday morning at Muan International Airport, marking the deadliest air accident in South Korean history and sending shockwaves through the nation’s transportation industry.
Jeju Air Flight 607, a Boeing 737-800 carrying 175 passengers and six crew members, crashed dramatically during its landing approach, resulting in a staggering 179 fatalities. Only two crew members survived the horrific incident.
The aircraft, which originated from Bangkok at 1:30 a.m., was approaching its scheduled 8:30 a.m. arrival when tragedy struck. Witnesses described a terrifying sequence of events: the plane veered off the runway, skidding along the ground without deployed landing gear before violently colliding with a concrete wall and erupting into a massive fireball.
“The aircraft has almost completely been destroyed,” a firefighting official stated, highlighting the extreme severity of the crash. “Identifying the deceased will be a challenging and time-consuming process.”
The two survivors were immediately transported to separate Seoul hospitals, with medical teams working urgently to assess their conditions.
This catastrophe surpasses previous South Korean aviation tragedies, including the 1983 Soviet shootdown of a Korean Air flight that killed 269 people and a 1997 crash in Guam that claimed 225 lives.
Investigators are already beginning the painstaking work of determining the crash’s cause, with initial reports focusing on the aircraft’s unusual landing approach and equipment failure.
The nation stands in collective mourning, awaiting further details about this unprecedented aviation disaster.
