Jeju Air Flight 2216 Crashes in South Korea

At 8:54 am the Boeing 737-800NG operating the Jeju Air Flight 2216 was authorized to land at Muan International Airport in South Korea. As the plane was preparing to land, it was warned at 8:57 am about the potential for a bird strike. A minute later, it issued a mayday alert.At 9:00 a.m, the plane attempted an emergency landing, being forced to go around again after the landing gear was not deployed. A minute later, it received authorization to attempt a landing from the opposite direction. Most pilots are trained for situations like this.

The crash occurred as the aircraft attempted to perform a belly landing,touching down 1,200m along the runway, sliding down the runway on the engine nacelles with a sustained nose-high attitude. It continued 250m past the runway threshold before colliding with an embankment holding the ILS array and exploding.

If they were in a stabilised approach the landing gear would be down WAY before the bird strike zone. The Boeing 737-800NG did a go-around with no problems.

Then nothing like this has ever happened, a plane comes in without landing gear, speed close to take off and on at least at 50% power until it contacted an object on the ground - Pilots missed alternate landing gear extension, alternate flap extension, approach and landing speed judgement, diversion, not correctly configure the aircraft for landing, way too fast, way too far down the runway before touchdown, 15-degree nose-up. Either a complete loss of throttle control or the pilots tried to climb out and it was too late.

We have seen pilots ignore repeated alarms in the coughpit, warnings from the GPWS many times including PIA8303 and Air France 447. This is more than likely another example of a crew doing everything other than what they should have been doing.

There are 3 hydraulic systems aboard the 737 - system A, B and Stand by. The A system powers the landing gear for retraction, extension, and nose wheel steering. The B system powers the flaps and leading edge devices, with an electric backup that can extend and retract the flaps. All have redundancy but a complete failure of all 3 hydraulic systems and the backup electrical system to operate the flaps is damn near impossible.

APU can provide electrical power to the electric motor driven pumps (EMDP's) and thus supply hydraulic pressure. One of the amazing things that Captain Sullenberger did, when they first hit the birds on takeoff was immediately start the APU, before he did anything else, as I guess he knew he might lose both engine power from the birds.

Hydraulics not required for emergency use of flaps and landing gear on 737. Pilots should be able to manually drop the landing gear no matter what. Landing gear can be manually extended with the 3 red handles-Right Main, Nose and Left Main-behind crew seats on the floor, physically connected to each strut that when pulled releases the gear which falls and locks into place by their own weight and wind drag. On Boeing 737-800 NG, the manual extension handles will function with the landing gear lever in any position.

However it does take time. Crew only gave themselves 7 minutes to execute check lists and final between loss of signal on initial approach and attempted go around.

There’s really no explanation for the gear being retracted other than the pilot forgot. The Control Tower should have informed them that their landing gear was not down though. The aircraft won’t even allow use of thrust reversers unless you have main gear strut compression, in this case with the gear still retracted there may not be any thrust reversers nor spoilers available.

The lack of ADS-B during the final landing implies a complete loss of power.

Passengers from the same aircraft 2 days ago reported one engine kept switching off during the flight. The aircraft diverted to Incheon International Airport while operating Jeju Air flight 8135 to Beijing Daxing International Airport originating from Jeju International Airport. The aircraft was in cruise flight transiting the Yellow Sea at FL320 when the flight crew declared an emergency. A descent and diversion to Searle Incheon International Airport (ICN) was then carried out. Flight crew squawked emergency transponder code 7700, declaring an emergency when established on the descent on track to the diversion airport.

The aviation industry is built on redundancy and there are very few single-point failures in airplane design or airplane operations A combination of unlucky factors including ongoing mechanical issues, a bird strike, and poor crew resource management caused this crash. Also it appears the airport was expecting an emergency landing.

MWX runway 19 has a Landing Distance 2800m. The end of Runway 19 is about 6 m below its threshold. The embankment is to raise the localizer array, to compensate for the runway slope. However, within the United States and Canada these would be required to be mounted on frangible support structures. You want the support structure to break-away and cause as minimal damage as possible in a scenario like this. You would not be allowed to construct an earth mound like this within the runway overruns. This localizer is about 150m off the overrun, which would violate North American Airfield criteria, but it's a Korean Airport so regulations are different.

My guessing
Birdstrike with severe damage on the right engine and crew incorrectly shuts down the left engine, losing both engines.
Immediate turn back to land tailwind opposite direction.
Split decisions, forgot the landing gear.

The plane wasn't ready for that belly landing at all.
-Nalliah Thayabharan
 
How long would checklists take to effect this under non emergency circumstances?.
In normal circumstances, checklists wouldn't be any sort of issue. After the go around, when you level off, the support pilot would quickly run the after takeoff c/l (which only has a few items), and then as you were coming on to finals, the landing c/l, which is also short. You'd need to fly about 2 nm past the far end of the the runway to give yourself adequate room for finals.
 
My guessing
Birdstrike with severe damage on the right engine and crew incorrectly shuts down the left engine, losing both engines.
Immediate turn back to land tailwind opposite direction.
Split decisions, forgot the landing gear.

The plane wasn't ready for that belly landing at all.
-Nalliah Thayabharan
Hell of a guess. As you've got it all worked out, how about a discussion of energy management during base turn on a glide approach.
 
My guessing
Birdstrike with severe damage on the right engine and crew incorrectly shuts down the left engine, losing both engines.
Immediate turn back to land tailwind opposite direction.
Split decisions, forgot the landing gear.

The plane wasn't ready for that belly landing at all.
-Nalliah Thayabharan
I think it is a little early to be making fairly extreme guesses like that.

The lack of flaps + landing gear suggests to me that power had been lost to both engines and they needed to minimise drag just to make it back to the runway, and then they were essentially bought undone by the ground effect which caused the actual touch down to be far longer than where they had aimed for.

I think that this is one of those ones where there are a lot of things that we aren't yet aware of and an analysis of the coughpit voice recorders and data recorders will be reveal a lot of what isn't yet known - there could be factors that nobody has even guessed yet.
 
Aircraft attitude on final approach seems good and Thurst reverser on the right engine appear to have deployed so hydraulics in some form was working...
Yes, that's right. If the B system (linked to the number 2 engine) has failed, and let's just imagine that both the electric motor and engine driven pump are not working due to the engine failure, then the standby system can open the reverser sleeves although it happens at a much slower rate.

In normal circumstances, if an engine has failed, the engine driven pump will not have sufficient pressure (<1300psi) to provide fluid to the relevant systems. So, the electric pump can do all the work and the hydraulic system operates normally.

The thrust reverser can be unlocked when RA (Radio Altitude) is <10ft or the air/ground sensor is in ground mode. Even if the engine is not running, the thrust reverser levers can still be pulled to the 1st detent but obviously can not be pulled any further and actually engage reverse.
 
Yes, that's right. If the B system (linked to the number 2 engine) has failed, and let's just imagine that both the electric motor and engine driven pump are not working due to the engine failure, then the standby system can open the reverser sleeves although it happens at a much slower rate.

In normal circumstances, if an engine has failed, the engine driven pump will not have sufficient pressure (<1300psi) to provide fluid to the relevant systems. So, the electric pump can do all the work and the hydraulic system operates normally.

The thrust reverser can be unlocked when RA (Radio Altitude) is <10ft or the air/ground sensor is in ground mode. Even if the engine is not running, the thrust reverser levers can still be pulled to the 1st detent but obviously can not be pulled any further and actually engage reverse.
Do you happen to know which system failing would cause the ADSB to stop transmitting? That may give us a bit more of an idea of what else was failing on the airplane - besides obviously the right engine.
 
At 8:54 am the Boeing 737-800NG operating the Jeju Air Flight 2216 was authorized to land at Muan International Airport in South Korea. As the plane was preparing to land, it was warned at 8:57 am about the potential for a bird strike. A minute later, it issued a mayday alert.At 9:00 a.m, the plane attempted an emergency landing, being forced to go around again after the landing gear was not deployed. A minute later, it received authorization to attempt a landing from the opposite direction. Most pilots are trained for situations like this.

The crash occurred as the aircraft attempted to perform a belly landing,touching down 1,200m along the runway, sliding down the runway on the engine nacelles with a sustained nose-high attitude. It continued 250m past the runway threshold before colliding with an embankment holding the ILS array and exploding.

If they were in a stabilised approach the landing gear would be down WAY before the bird strike zone. The Boeing 737-800NG did a go-around with no problems.

Then nothing like this has ever happened, a plane comes in without landing gear, speed close to take off and on at least at 50% power until it contacted an object on the ground - Pilots missed alternate landing gear extension, alternate flap extension, approach and landing speed judgement, diversion, not correctly configure the aircraft for landing, way too fast, way too far down the runway before touchdown, 15-degree nose-up. Either a complete loss of throttle control or the pilots tried to climb out and it was too late.

We have seen pilots ignore repeated alarms in the coughpit, warnings from the GPWS many times including PIA8303 and Air France 447. This is more than likely another example of a crew doing everything other than what they should have been doing.

There are 3 hydraulic systems aboard the 737 - system A, B and Stand by. The A system powers the landing gear for retraction, extension, and nose wheel steering. The B system powers the flaps and leading edge devices, with an electric backup that can extend and retract the flaps. All have redundancy but a complete failure of all 3 hydraulic systems and the backup electrical system to operate the flaps is damn near impossible.

APU can provide electrical power to the electric motor driven pumps (EMDP's) and thus supply hydraulic pressure. One of the amazing things that Captain Sullenberger did, when they first hit the birds on takeoff was immediately start the APU, before he did anything else, as I guess he knew he might lose both engine power from the birds.

Hydraulics not required for emergency use of flaps and landing gear on 737. Pilots should be able to manually drop the landing gear no matter what. Landing gear can be manually extended with the 3 red handles-Right Main, Nose and Left Main-behind crew seats on the floor, physically connected to each strut that when pulled releases the gear which falls and locks into place by their own weight and wind drag. On Boeing 737-800 NG, the manual extension handles will function with the landing gear lever in any position.

However it does take time. Crew only gave themselves 7 minutes to execute check lists and final between loss of signal on initial approach and attempted go around.

There’s really no explanation for the gear being retracted other than the pilot forgot. The Control Tower should have informed them that their landing gear was not down though. The aircraft won’t even allow use of thrust reversers unless you have main gear strut compression, in this case with the gear still retracted there may not be any thrust reversers nor spoilers available.

The lack of ADS-B during the final landing implies a complete loss of power.

Passengers from the same aircraft 2 days ago reported one engine kept switching off during the flight. The aircraft diverted to Incheon International Airport while operating Jeju Air flight 8135 to Beijing Daxing International Airport originating from Jeju International Airport. The aircraft was in cruise flight transiting the Yellow Sea at FL320 when the flight crew declared an emergency. A descent and diversion to Searle Incheon International Airport (ICN) was then carried out. Flight crew squawked emergency transponder code 7700, declaring an emergency when established on the descent on track to the diversion airport.

The aviation industry is built on redundancy and there are very few single-point failures in airplane design or airplane operations A combination of unlucky factors including ongoing mechanical issues, a bird strike, and poor crew resource management caused this crash. Also it appears the airport was expecting an emergency landing.

MWX runway 19 has a Landing Distance 2800m. The end of Runway 19 is about 6 m below its threshold. The embankment is to raise the localizer array, to compensate for the runway slope. However, within the United States and Canada these would be required to be mounted on frangible support structures. You want the support structure to break-away and cause as minimal damage as possible in a scenario like this. You would not be allowed to construct an earth mound like this within the runway overruns. This localizer is about 150m off the overrun, which would violate North American Airfield criteria, but it's a Korean Airport so regulations are different.

My guessing
Birdstrike with severe damage on the right engine and crew incorrectly shuts down the left engine, losing both engines.
Immediate turn back to land tailwind opposite direction.
Split decisions, forgot the landing gear.

The plane wasn't ready for that belly landing at all.
-Nalliah Thayabharan
Whoa...I would love to know how they didn't stall then if they had no engines? Minimum clean speed is around 200KIAS give or take.

The QRH asks for an all flap up landing to maintain Vref40+55 (around 190KIAS at a conservative weight), and of course assuming you've still got engines.
 
The videos are very noisy and there is at least an exhaust heat plume visible, conjecture suggests they were averaging 152kt from the keys to the llz…
 
Do you happen to know which system failing would cause the ADSB to stop transmitting? That may give us a bit more of an idea of what else was failing on the airplane - besides obviously the right engine.
It would have to be all 3 AC sources are down. So that is, both engines have failed and there's no APU. In other words, on battery power only.

If they were on battery power, then only VHF1 and Transponder1 are available. If the switch had been moved to the second transponder at the start of the flight this could give a reason as to why there may have been a black out?
 
It would have to be all 3 AC sources are down. So that is, both engines have failed and there's no APU. In other words, on battery power only.

If they were on battery power, then only VHF1 and Transponder1 are available. If the switch had been moved to the second transponder at the start of the flight this could give a reason as to why there may have been a black out?
Many thanks AV - that suggests that they did lose both engines then - either simultaneous bird strikes or possibly the initial one in the right engine then another one subsequently - and at that stage they were left with no option but to glide - which supported by the lack of flaps and landing gear, and the landing in the other direction.
 
the plane attempted an emergency landing, being forced to go around again after the landing gear was not deployed
There is no information of a prior attempt at an emergency landing


sustained nose-high attitude
This is a Lot airlines 767 non landing gear successful landing. I dont think we can read anything into the attitude of the aircraft - until the crash report has been released.
Screen Shot 2024-12-31 at 2.59.36 pm.png


complete failure of all 3 hydraulic systems and the backup electrical system to operate the flaps is damn near impossible.
But not impossible.


7 minutes to execute check lists and final between loss of signal on initial approach and attempted go around.
Loss of ADS-B to crash = 7 minutes


There’s really no explanation for the gear being retracted other than the pilot forgot
Hmm, I would rather wait for a Crash investigation report


The lack of ADS-B during the final landing implies a complete loss of power.
The 737-800 has a main battery and aux battery designed to provide up to (I think) 60 min of Standby power? The systems have an Auto setting which automatically switches to battery in the event of failure of AC power. What is powered with Standby battery power?


Passengers from the same aircraft 2 days ago reported one engine kept switching off during the flight.
How would passengers know if an engine was on or off?

My guessing
Not a good idea....
 
Though there is a manual release for the landing gear.
Perhaps they were worried about reaching the airport and kept the aircraft configuration clean - minimising drag?
That is what I was trying to suggest - they deliberately kept the gear (and flaps) retracted so as they could make the glide back to the airport
 
they deliberately kept the gear (and flaps) retracted so as they could make the glide back to the airport
It does not make sense etiher because they ground effect drifted down the runway and ?could? have known they did have enough energy when they were on final approach for the final time. Sure not a lot of time and they may also have been cognitively overloaded keeping the aircraft straight and level.
 
It does not make sense etiher because they ground effect drifted down the runway and ?could? have known they did have enough energy when they were on final approach for the final time. Sure not a lot of time and they may also have been cognitively overloaded keeping the aircraft straight and level.
It’s plausible if they had no speed data to add to the limited power scenarios as a result of the bird strike
 
It does not make sense etiher because they ground effect drifted down the runway and ?could? have known they did have enough energy when they were on final approach for the final time. Sure not a lot of time and they may also have been cognitively overloaded keeping the aircraft straight and level.
They might have been both mentally and physically setup for a belly landing, and by the time they knew for sure that they were going to make it back to the airport there might not have been enough time to reconfigure for a more normal landing - or perhaps they weren't confident that everything required would work - or that it might make things worse for the landing - eg a severely too fast landing snapping the landing gear off. At the moment we don't even know by how far they vertically cleared the perimeter fence on the approach - were they on a fairly normal glide slope for that runway or did they barely make the airport?

Unfortunately there are just too many things that we don't yet know for us to know why they made the decisions they did - it may prove that the decisions they made were the best decisions for the circumstances in which they found themselves in
 
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The embankment:
The localiser antenna sits on a concrete foundation on top of the embankment
Inertia of embankment....

Screen Shot 2024-12-31 at 3.45.59 pm.png

DXB has a highway overpass just past RWY12 ?480m
LHR has a concrete wall across the perimeter road 280m from the end of the RWY27

(Just for my record): QF1 stopped in 220m with the soft ground providing a lot of drag on the landing gear. The nose did reach the perimeter road)

It’s plausible if they had no speed data
Should be available even on Standby battery power?
 
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To our Domestic Pilots on board, what would be the more attractive over run airports locally? Brisbane seems to have plenty of space on the old runway at both ends, Avalon looks like another good candidate.
 
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