A Jeju Air flight from Seoul on Monday was forced to return after encountering a landing gear problem, the airline said, a day after South Korea’s most deadly plane crash.
The Boeing 737-800 involved in the latest incident was the same model as the Jeju Air plane that crashed on Sunday killing 179 people after coming down without its landing gear engaged.
Jeju Air Flight 7C101, which departed Seoul’s Gimpo International Airport for Jeju island “at around 6:37 am, returned to Gimpo at 7:25 am” after a landing gear issue was detected shortly after takeoff, the South Korean airline said.
“Shortly after takeoff, a signal indicating a landing gear issue was detected on the aircraft’s monitoring system,” Song Kyung-hoon, head of the management support office at Jeju Air, told a news conference.
“At 6:57 am, the captain communicated with ground control, and after taking additional measures, the landing gear returned to normal operation. However, the decision was made to return to the airport for a thorough inspection of the aircraft.”
Local media reported that 21 passengers chose not to board an alternate flight to Jeju, citing concerns over safety and other reasons.
Jeju Air’s 41 plane fleet includes 39 Boeing 737-800 aircraft.
Seoul said on Monday it would conduct a special inspection of all 101 Boeing 737-800 planes in operation in the country, with US investigators, possibly including from plane manufacturer Boeing, joining the probe into the crash.
“We are reviewing plans to conduct a special inspection on B737-800 aircraft,” said Joo Jong-wan, head of the aviation policy bureau at the South Korean transport ministry.
Joo added that the government plans to “implement rigorous aviation safety inspections in response to the (landing gear) incidents”.
In Sunday’s crash at Muan, the Jeju Air Boeing 737-800 Flight 2216, carrying 181 people from Thailand to South Korea, made a mayday call and belly-landed before crashing into a barrier and bursting into flames.
Everyone on board Jeju Air Flight 2216 was killed, save two flight attendants pulled from the wreckage.
After the Sunday accident, the low-cost carrier told AFP Monday it was facing a wave of cancellations.
“From midnight the previous day (Sunday) to 1:00 pm today (0400 GMT Monday), the number of canceled flight tickets totaled approximately 68,000,” a Jeju Air official told AFP.
Domestic flights accounted for around 33,000 cancellations, while international flights cancellations stood at around 34,000, the company said.
An inflow of new bookings, however, was still maintained, the company added.
“Given the current situation, the cancellation rate is slightly higher than usual. However, the inflow of new bookings remains steady,” Song Kyung-hoon, head of the management support office at Jeju Air, told a news conference.
Major travel agencies were also reporting mass cancellations due to crash-related travel anxiety.
“We got at least 400 cancellations in the first hour of our opening,” a travel agency, one of the country’s biggest, told AFP.
“Many also are asking if their aircraft is the Boeing 737-800, and if so, they want to cancel,” they said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
