Why was there a wall near runway at S Korea plane crash airport? • Hacker News Board

Re: Why was there a wall near runway at S Korea plane crash airport?

#201

Post by neom » Mon, Jan 06, 2025, 2:06 AM UTC

bombcar wrote: post #142

neom wrote: post #99

My wife is South Korean (from andong). I asked her and she looked at me like I'd grown a second head "because it's South Korea? We're a young country and that is tiny airport in the south, half of Korea is a safety hazard and you know that fine well, some freaking idiot put a wall there, oh well, it's korea" and walked off pretty angry I'd even asked.

To be fair to her, check out some of the other things that have happened. Compared to that mall collapse, a berm that far off the end of the runway won’t even be notable.

Oh I'm fully aware, I take no issue with her ire, just didn't expect that answer, tho I should have. To her point, the South of South Korea, especially in the country area, has loads of stuff like this, there are disasters waiting to happen everywhere, much of the infrastructure should be gone through with a fine tooth comb really, like this still both boggles my mind and boils my blood: https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/fire-south-korean...

They used a HIGHLY flammable material to completely cover a raised highway.

(All of that said, I read from so many people now that the plane would have disintegrated once it did finally start to drag given the speed, and there is another parameter wall shortly after the berm.)

Re: Why was there a wall near runway at S Korea plane crash airport?

#202

Post by SR2Z » Mon, Jan 06, 2025, 2:10 AM UTC

markdown wrote: post #188

reso wrote: post #149

The wall is a red herring. The plane landed halfway down the runway at high speed. Something bad is going to happen if you do that at any runway on earth. In SFO you'll end up in the bay or hit the terminal depending on the orientation. In Toronto you'll crash into a highway. Stop looking at the wall and look at the minutes before the crash.

What a lame comment. This isn't how aviation safety is managed. You expect planes to land halfway down the runway at high speed and out of control. It's an eventual certainty. > In SFO you'll end up in the bay or hit the terminal depending on the orientation. In Toronto you'll crash into a highway. Ending up in a bay or crashing into a highway would likely have resulted in far less loss of life.

Crashing into a highway would have resulted in similar loss of life. Airplanes are only barely safe when they land without gear, and almost any obstruction is going to be more solid than a machine that's built to be as lightweight as possible.

There is no way to make a runway safe if a plane lands halfway down it, even if the brakes and landing gear are actually working. It's just not possible; runways are limited by geography and we tend to run aircraft as heavy as possible.

Re: Why was there a wall near runway at S Korea plane crash airport?

#203

Post by reisse » Mon, Jan 06, 2025, 2:10 AM UTC

teleforce wrote: post #180

reso wrote: post #149

The wall is a red herring. The plane landed halfway down the runway at high speed. Something bad is going to happen if you do that at any runway on earth. In SFO you'll end up in the bay or hit the terminal depending on the orientation. In Toronto you'll crash into a highway. Stop looking at the wall and look at the minutes before the crash.

To continue your idiom, it's not a red herring, it's the elephant in the room. Seriously, I think the incident it's a hard lesson for airport designer and ICAO. For better civil aviation safety, the next airport runway should have ample room for safer aircraft landing without landing gears. Previously there's no real-time aircraft tracking requirement for passenger aircraft only for cargo, but after MH370 it's mandat…

No amount of ample room will help if the plane touches down overshooting more than half of the runway.

Furthermore (this is pure speculation at the moment) I think chances are the crew were kind of cosplaying PIA PK-8303 - forgot about landing gears in a stress from bird strike, attempted go-around after realising it, but had not enough power from engines due to bird strike or ground hit. It's plausible final investigation report will conclude absence of localizer antennas wouldn't save them.

Re: Why was there a wall near runway at S Korea plane crash airport?

#204

Post by dredmorbius » Mon, Jan 06, 2025, 2:13 AM UTC

dredmorbius wrote: post #197

reso wrote: post #149

The wall is a red herring. The plane landed halfway down the runway at high speed. Something bad is going to happen if you do that at any runway on earth. In SFO you'll end up in the bay or hit the terminal depending on the orientation. In Toronto you'll crash into a highway. Stop looking at the wall and look at the minutes before the crash.

At the moment before encountering the Muan Murder Wall, there were 181 souls alive, healthy, and uninjured aboard Jeju Air Flight 2216. At the moment after encountering the Muan Murder Wall, there were 2 souls alive, one severely injured, and 179 corpses, most mutilated beyond all recognition. Multiple things had clearly gone wrong with the flight, and we're going to have to wait for results of investigations to dete…

I'm going through more of the Wikipedia category entries.

AA 1420 (1999) is notable for similarities with Jeju 2216:

The aircraft continued past the end of the runway, traveling another 800 feet (240 m; 270 yd), and striking a security fence and an ILS localizer array. The aircraft then collided with a structure built to support the approach lights for Runway 22L, which extended out into the Arkansas River. Such structures are usually frangible, designed to shear off on impact, but because the approach lights were located on the unstable river bank, they were firmly anchored. The collision with the sturdy structure crushed the airplane's nose, and destroyed the left side of the plane's fuselage, from the cockpit back to the first two rows of coach seating. The impact broke the aircraft apart into large sections, which came to a rest short of the river bank.

Captain Buschmann and 8 of the plane's 139 passengers were immediately killed in the crash; another two passengers died in the hospital in the weeks that followed.

145 souls, 139 pax, 6 crew, 11 fatalities, 110 injured, 134 survivors.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Airlines_Flight_1420>

Even though this aircraft also hit an ILS structure, fatalities were far lower than those of Jeju 2216, likely as AA 1420 had decelerated significantly both on the runway (despite severely limited wheel and air brakes) and its subsequent 240 cross-terrain slide.

Atlantic Airways Flight 670 (2006) literally fell off a cliff. 4 fatalities of 16 souls. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_Airways_Flight_670>

Bangkok Airways Flight 266 (2009) literally struck a (presumably nonfrangible) control tower. 1 fatality, 71 souls. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bangkok_Airways_Flight_266>

Re: Why was there a wall near runway at S Korea plane crash airport?

#205

Post by dredmorbius » Mon, Jan 06, 2025, 2:15 AM UTC

tooltalk wrote: post #184

reso wrote: post #149

The wall is a red herring. The plane landed halfway down the runway at high speed. Something bad is going to happen if you do that at any runway on earth. In SFO you'll end up in the bay or hit the terminal depending on the orientation. In Toronto you'll crash into a highway. Stop looking at the wall and look at the minutes before the crash.

Occam's razor: the wall is most probably the cause of the unnecessary explosion that killed 179 people. The airport built ILS, or localizer, on unnecessarily over-engineered concrete structure where there shouldn't have been any obstruction. The ILS are supposed to be built on level surface or "frangile" structure so they can be easily destroyed when there is an overrun. There are reportedly at least 4 other airports…

You might find AA 1420 (1999) of interest, similar situation though far fewer fatalities (11 of 145 souls):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Airlines_Flight_1420>

Partially-effective runway braking and a much greater distance from runway perimeter to the nonfrangible ILS structure likely played a role.

Re: Why was there a wall near runway at S Korea plane crash airport?

#206

Post by mianos » Mon, Jan 06, 2025, 2:15 AM UTC

hu3 wrote: post #137

blueflow wrote: post #77

I'll recite an avherald comment: If you look at "Video of aircraft after touchdown sliding along the runway and impacting the fence:", you will find out that it took them ~1.7 sec from leaving the tarmac until they hit the construction. If you measure the distance on Google earth you come up with ~140m. That means they hit the construction with roughly 296km/h or 160 knots. If it wasn't the construction it would have…

160 knots? Google tells me: "Modern jets land between 120–150 kt. This depends on weight, weather conditions and several other factors." So even after scratching asphalt for 2/3 of the runway it was still faster than the normal landing speed. My uneducated gut feeling says pilot was trying to abort the landing.

There were no flaps deployed. Without flaps it's going to be a lot faster than a normal landing.

Re: Why was there a wall near runway at S Korea plane crash airport?

#207

Post by tolciho » Mon, Jan 06, 2025, 2:16 AM UTC

cameronh90 wrote: post #156

inoffensivename wrote: post #92

Lots of airports have obstacles not far from the end of the runway. Burbank, Midway, Orange County are a few that come to mind. Why did they need to land when they did? Why did they need to land so soon after the mayday call? (only 8 minutes from mayday to crash, as I understand it) Why couldn't they land on a longer runway? Why did they land so far down the runway? What forced them to land in a clean configuration?…

The obstacle obviously didn't cause the crash, but it's still probable that fewer people would have died if it wasn't there, and it seems to have been put there for no valid reason, quite recently, and against standard practice. Along with the reports that their bird control devices had not been implemented and that only 1 of the required 4 staff to repel birds were on duty. All these factors together may suggest an…

"Normal Accidents" is a term for when things, well, normally go sideways in complex systems, and there's a whole book on it. Otherwise, it's pretty typical in disasters for there to be a laundry list of root causes and contributing factors: the Titanic was going too fast, there was hubris, and icebergs, and it was sad when the great boat went down. Could the disaster have been missed or been less bad if one or several factors had rolled up some other result? Maybe! That's what a full investigation is for, to suss out what went wrong and what things are most fixable.

Re: Why was there a wall near runway at S Korea plane crash airport?

#208

Post by dredmorbius » Mon, Jan 06, 2025, 2:17 AM UTC

likeabatterycar wrote: post #192

tooltalk wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Occam's razor: the wall is most probably the cause of the unnecessary explosion that killed 179 people. The airport built ILS, or localizer, on unnecessarily over-engineered concrete structure where there shouldn't have been any obstruction. The ILS are supposed to be built on level surface or "frangile" structure so they can be easily destroyed when there is an overrun. There are reportedly at least 4 other airports…

[flagged]

The pilots on 9/11 were intentionally directing their aircraft toward specific structures to maximise destruction, casualties, and terrorist impact. That was their express intent and mission for which they had specifically trained.

In all likelihood the pilot of Jeju 2216 was not specifically directing his aircraft to the nonfrangible ILS Muan Murder Wall. There is no way to charitably argue otherwise.

Re: Why was there a wall near runway at S Korea plane crash airport?

#209

Post by mianos » Mon, Jan 06, 2025, 2:22 AM UTC

whycome wrote: post #118

gazchop wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They already botched a gear down landing, which is almost never mentioned. They retracted the gear and did a teardrop go around from a headwind into a tailwind belly flop. Stinks of bad crew resource management and ATC which is why the ATC and airline for raided by SK officials.

Botched how?

Botched by not using the manual gravity gear drop. Maybe they didn't have enough time. But losing a single engine is not necessarily fatal at that flight phase. Most professionals are still questioning why the rush to get it down. If there is some valid reason, aside from accidentally shutting down the other engine, when we do find out the details, maybe the professionals won't call it botched.

Re: Why was there a wall near runway at S Korea plane crash airport?

#210

Post by unyttigfjelltol » Mon, Jan 06, 2025, 2:30 AM UTC

sho_hn wrote: post #148

iso8859-1 wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The localizer antenna mount (the concrete) was inside the airport perimeter. See diagram: https://multimedia.scmp.com/embeds/2024/world/skorea-crash/i...

The OP knows this already. What they were saying is that just because other airports feature runways situated next to natural obstacles and this is allowed and equally dangerous, it doesn't mean this airport needed to have this particular, deliberately designed and implemented obstacle next to the runway. The reason for the concrete-reinforced berm was typhoon resilience. It begs the question whether there are altern…

And if an accident occurred because a typhoon washed out the antenna, people would argue a concrete foundation would have been safer.

As an aside, this reminds of the consideration highway bureaus in the US give to trees and poles.[1] Trees are removed and poles should break easily and fall after a vehicle impact. This comes to mind because I have given most thought to these considerations as a pedestrian, regretting tree removals and feeling exposed to passing cars in a system designed to accommodate them safely (for them) departing the roadway anywhere, anytime. Of course, sometimes broken poles fall on cars or people, power outages are more routine especially after vehicular accidents, and there are other tradeoffs too, some of which are safety-related.

[1] https://safety.fhwa.dot.gov/roadway_dept/countermeasures/saf...