Concrete barrier blamed for fatal South Korea jet crash built to save money: Report
A government-commissioned simulation showed that all passengers would have survived had the concrete structure not been present.
In this photo taken on Dec 14, 2025, a damaged structure is seen at the end of the runway at Muan International Airport, where Jeju Air's Flight 2216 crashed after making a belly landing on Dec 29, 2024. (File photo: AFP/Anthony Wallace)
SEOUL: A concrete barrier blamed for a deadly South Korean jet crash that killed 179 people in December 2024 had been built to cut costs, the state auditor said on Tuesday (Mar 10).
Jeju Air Flight 2216 was coming in to land at Muan International Airport from Thailand when it struck a flock of birds and was forced to make a belly landing.
While the pilots managed to put the aircraft down and slide it along the runway, it burst into a fireball after colliding with a concrete structure buried inside a mound at the end of the runway, killing 179 people on board.
Only two flight attendants seated in the tail section survived.
A government-commissioned simulation released earlier this year found that all passengers would have survived had the concrete structure supporting the localisers - a navigation antenna system that helps aircraft during landing - not been present.
The Board of Audit and Inspection said in a report that the concrete structure had been built by the transport ministry as it "sought to reduce costs".
The report said the terrain where Muan airport's runway and runway end safety area were constructed was sloping.
Instead of flattening the area - which would have required significant earthworks and higher expenditure - officials chose to install the localiser on a concrete structure elevated above the runway, the audit report said.
"This reduced the required volume of earthwork. The resulting height difference with the runway's highest point was then addressed by building an embankment," it said.
International aviation safety guidelines state that such navigation facilities must be made of frangible, or breakable, materials.
The simulation report said that if the localisers had been supported by a frangible structure, "the resulting impact would not have been severe enough to cause serious injuries".
The aircraft "would have slid for approximately 770m before coming to a stop" had the runway been free of obstacles, the study found.
