The black box from the South Korean plane crash did not record the last 4 minutes, officials said

Black boxes for passenger plane that crashed in South Korea last month killed 179 people stopped filming about four minutes before the crash, South Korean officials said Saturday.

After analyzing the devices, i The US National Transportation Safety Board concluded that both the plane’s data and cockpit voice recorders stopped working about four minutes before the crash, South Korea’s Ministry of Transport said.

I Boeing 737-800 operated by Jeju Air overran the runway in the South Korean city of Muan on December 29 after its landing gear failed, crashed into a concrete structure and burst into flames, killing all but two of the 181 on board.

South Korean officials also sent the black boxes to the NTSB for further examination after discovering that some information was missing.

The Department of Transport said it was not clear why the machines failed to record data four minutes ago.

“Information from the CVR (cockpit voice recorder) and FDR (flight data recorder) is important in the investigation of accidents, but this investigation is carried out through the examination and analysis of various sources of information, and we plan to do everything in our power to find the cause of the accident,” said the Ministry in a statement. .

South Korean investigators said air traffic controllers warned the pilot about a possible bird strike two minutes before the plane issued an announcement confirming a bird strike, after which the pilot attempted to make an emergency landing.

After the accident, authorities immediately ordered an inspection of all 737-800 aircraft operated by the country’s airlines – dozens of aircraft in total – after the accident.

South Korean officials have also promised to improve airport security after experts linked the high death toll to the Muan airport system, the building hit by the plane when it crashed. The localizer, a set of antennas designed to guide the aircraft during landing, was housed in a dirt-covered concrete structure on a high ridge. This raised questions about whether the building should have been built with light materials that would break easily upon impact.