Investigators say they have found evidence of bird impact into a passenger aircraft that crashed in South Korea in December and killed 179 people.
Fear and blood stains on both aircraft motors are eaten from a Baikal Tirk, a type of duck migratory that gathers in large flocks, according to a preliminary investigating report published on Monday.
An accident investigation – the most deadly on the South Korean soil – will now focus on the role of hitting birds and concrete structures at the end of the runway into which the aircraft crashed.
Boeing 737-800 engines will be demolished, and concrete construction will be further examined, the report reads.
The aircraft Jeju Air took off from Bangkok on the morning of December 29 and flew to the Muan International Airport in the southwest of the country.
Around 08:57 local time, three minutes after the pilots made contact with the airport, the control tower advised the crew to be careful about the “bird activity”.
At 08:59, the pilot reported that the aircraft had hit the bird and gave a signal to begin with.
The pilot then asked for permission to land from the opposite direction, landing on his stomach without an activated trap. He flew a runway and exploded after hitting a concrete structure, the report said.
Authorities said earlier that flight data and voting recorders from a cockpit from an aircraft stopped recording about four minutes before the disaster.
Experts who operated the same type of aircraft that participated in the accident also questioned the presence of concrete barriers along the runway – some suggest that the number of victims would be smaller if they were gone.
The concrete structure holds a navigation system that helps landing aircraft, known as a localizer.
The South Korean Ministry of Transport has said that this system can be found in other airports in the country and even abroad.
Last week the authorities announced that they would change concrete barriers used to navigate at seven airports across the country. Seven airports will also have adapted run -up areas after examination.
The preliminary report was submitted to the United Nations agency for aviation and the United States, France and Thailand.
