Muan, South Korea – Muan International Airport looks like any other airport during the holidays. Its parking lot is filled with hundreds of cars, while the doors of the departure and arrival gates are full of activity.
However, it’s nothing like any other airport, and there’s not a breath of rest in the show. It has been two days since the airport halted all operations following a deadly passenger plane crash on Sunday that left only two survivors out of a total of 181 passengers and crew. Jeju Air Flight 2216 from Thailand to South Korea crashed into a concrete barrier and was immediately engulfed in a fireball after an emergency belly landing on the Muan Airport runway.
Inside the airport, in the country’s South Jeolla province, is a sea of people dressed in black, resembling a South Korean funeral. Families and friends gather around each other amid tears and wails of grief.
They are waiting to receive the remains of their loved ones, to join them for the last time.
Ki Hwe-man, 37, traveled more than five hours from the northern city of Paju after hearing that his uncle was one of the victims of the plane crash. He remembers his late uncle as a believer and a friend.
“When I was young I always kicked the soccer ball and my uncle often came to our house to watch us. He was the only adult during our family gatherings who came to play with the children,” Ki recalls. “He was always smart and an exemplary adult. He is someone I aspire to be one day.”
While close family members of the victims have been staying at the airport in makeshift tents and benches since Sunday, a large number of relatives and close friends from across the country began gathering at the airport the next day to mourn alongside them. .
Of the 179 dead, five victims have not yet been identified.
Many of the passengers were vacationing in Thailand, including 41 members of a package tour to Bangkok sold by a local travel agency. The oldest person was 78 years old, while the youngest was three years old.
“Just a day before my sister left for her trip, she visited our mother’s house in Gwangju to give her Christmas presents,” recalled a middle-aged man taking fresh air outside the airport who lost his sister and brother-in-law in collisions. “After making her try on new clothes, she told our mother she would be back soon.”
He recalls how his sister, who was younger than him, was the one who brought the family together after their father died last year.
“She was the one who suggested our trip to Yeosu last summer and Daecheon in the fall. She took care of our sick father during his last days. We took courage from her,” he says, before leaving, overcome with emotion.
A nationwide period of mourning has been declared for seven days with memorials erected in cities across the country. Less than 10 km (6.2 miles) from Muan Airport, a memorial altar was erected at the city’s sports complex to honor the victims.
Jeon Myung-hwan came down from Seoul to say his last goodbye to his best friend.
“My friend and his wife were on their retirement trip and we even spoke on the phone last week. We talked about going on a trip of our own soon,” Jeon tells Al Jazeera in a trembling voice.
Having met in high school in their hometown of Gwangyang, just a few hours east of Muan, the two friends got together at least once a year along with their other friends.
“We even got married at the same time, so our families would often meet up and go on trips together. He was gentle and quiet, but always looked after others like a big brother,” Jeon recalled.
Since his friend’s wife has not yet been identified by search efforts at the airport, her name is not on the funeral altar with the names of the other victims.
“It’s sad to see that my friend is not next to his wife at the altar,” says Jeon. “I hope he is at peace in heaven with his wife.”
On Tuesday, after two full days of recovery efforts, families were able to begin funerals after the first batch of bodies returned. However, families at the airport have expressed their frustration at the slow response from the authorities and raised concerns about holes in their leadership.
Park Han-shin, the families’ representative, even told reporters gathered at Muan Airport that he would “no longer fully trust the authorities” as he claimed they were too busy shifting blame among themselves.
South Korea is currently ruled by its third president in just one month. President Yoon Suk Yeol was removed from his presidential duties following his declaration of martial law earlier this month. Prime Minister Han Duk-soo, who was next in line, was voted out of his presidential role after just two weeks, leaving Finance Minister Choi Sang-mok to juggle national woes, a polarized political arena and a fallout economic history. acting president.
Choi’s order for an emergency safety inspection of the country’s entire airline operation includes a special inspection of all 101 Boeing 737-800 planes – the model involved in Sunday’s crash – operated by South Korean Airlines, focused on key component maintenance data.
While bird strike was early cited as a key factor in the accident, experts have questioned the extent of this theory being the sole cause of the accident. The plane’s cockpit voice recorder and flight data recorder have been collected by authorities for further analysis.
During its investigation, South Korean officials will have to examine questions such as the plane’s landing speed, its flaps open, the thrust reverser function and the landing gear deactivated. Locals in Muan have reported hearing explosions from the plane before it made an emergency landing.
Consequently, much of the public’s attention has focused on Jeju Air, the airline.
Bosses at the low-cost carrier bowed low and issued a public apology at a press conference hours after the plane went down on Sunday. Named after Jeju Island, the airline is the first and largest of South Korea’s budget airlines. Among the various concerns is over-utilization of the aircraft during the peak holiday travel season. The Jeju airliner that crashed on Sunday was found to have made 13 flights in the 48 hours before the incident, according to Yonhap news agency, which cited industry sources.
Local media have also highlighted online posts in the past purportedly written by former and current Jeju Air employees. Posting on the anonymous website Blind, a post from last year claimed the company’s efforts to “save maintenance costs” caused “four cases of engine failure in flight”. Another post apparently written by a company mechanic claimed that “other mechanics worked through the night over 13 to 14 hour shifts, with no time off except for lunch.”
About 68,000 Jeju Air reservations were canceled in the 24 hours following Sunday’s crash.
Questions also swirled about the concrete embankment at the end of Muan Airport’s runway, where the plane eventually crashed. According to Muan airport authorities, the housing of a localizer, an instrument to guide incoming aircraft, the embankment and the end of the runway were at least 250 meters (820 feet) apart, in accordance with safety regulations.
Back at the memorial altar in Muan, Song In-young, 61, says he is visiting from the neighboring town of Naju to pay his respects to the victims.
“We are not related by blood (among the victims), but I consider everyone who was on that flight to be my family. Especially for people like me who lived through brutal political repression in the 1980s, we feel a deep connection to the cities in this part of the region,” he says, citing the Gwangju massacre, which was known to have claimed hundreds of lives. from the army, which was in power at the time.
“I believe in an afterlife, so I wish all the victims peace in their future journeys,” says Song. “Most importantly, I hope all the remaining family members find peace as soon as possible.”
