Black Box Malfunction of South Korea's Crashed Passenger Aircraft: Last Four Minutes Unrecorded
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Seoul, Jan 11 (NationPress) The black box of a passenger aircraft that met with an accident in South Korea's southwestern airport late last month did not function properly for the last four minutes, as stated by the transport ministry on Saturday.
Analysis of the ill-fated plane's Flight Data Recorder (FDR) and Cockpit Voice Recorder (CVR) conducted by the US National Transportation Safety Board revealed that data recording in both the FDR and CVR ceased approximately four minutes prior to the plane's crash into a localizer, according to the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport.
The aviation railway accident investigation committee of the ministry intends to determine the cause behind the failure in data recording.
The localizer is a component of the instrument landing system that assists aircraft in following the runway centerline.
On December 29 of the previous year, a Jeju Air passenger aircraft with 181 individuals onboard from Bangkok made an unsuccessful landing, skidded off the runway, and collided with a concrete mound housing the localizer at the Muan International Airport, located about 290 km southwest of the capital Seoul.
This incident resulted in the tragic loss of 179 lives aboard the aircraft, while two crew members were rescued.
Six minutes prior to the crash, an air traffic controller at the airport issued a warning to the plane regarding a potential bird strike.
Four minutes before the accident, the plane's captain declared a Mayday and indicated a return to the airport, as reported by Xinhua news agency.
The ministry confirmed that the investigation into the accident would proceed through analysis of various data sources, excluding the FDR and CVR, promising to make every effort to uncover the truth behind the incident.
