A Korean Air flight heading to Taiwan dropped over 8,000 metres in just 15 minutes on Saturday, 22 June. The plane returned to Seoul’s Incheon International Airport where passengers and the aircraft were assessed before another flight was scheduled for the following day.
Flight KE189, operated on a Boeing 737 Max 8, departed Seoul at 4:45 pm local time on Saturday. About 50 minutes into the flight however, the plane suddenly dropped from an altitude of 10,767 metres to 2,560 metres, an 8,207-metre difference, in just 13 minutes, according to data from flight tracking website Flightradar24.
According to preliminary reports, the drop was caused by a malfunction in the plane’s pressurisation system. Oxygen masks dropped inside the cabin and the plane, wrongly detecting a pressure loss, dropped to a safe breathing altitude.
Videos shared by passengers on social media show the masks hanging from the ceiling while the aircraft seems to be shaking. One of the passengers told The Taipei Times that children were crying and he himself thought the plane was going to crash into the ground.
The aircraft landed back at the Incheon International Airport at 7:38 pm local time, where medical personnel awaited. From the 125 passengers on board, 15 suffered from hyperventilation and ear pain due to the sudden drop, according to the Korean Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport. “17 passengers have been attended to by medical professionals in Korea, and have been discharged without severe injuries”, Korean Air confirmed in a statement.
The passengers were boarded on a different aircraft to Taiwan the following day. Meanwhile, the airline said it is “fully cooperating with all relevant authorities to investigate the circumstances surrounding the incident”. The Boeing in question, which is less than 5 years old, will not be returned to service before a thorough investigation into the pressurisation system malfunction and the necessary maintenance to prevent similar faults in the future.
Earlier this year, a Latam Airlines Boeing 787-9 experienced a similar incident, the plane plummeting in mid air and sending passengers flying through the cabin. Following the Latam investigation, the aircraft manufacturer advised airlines to check pilot seats as a switch on their back could have pushed the pilot into the controls, triggering the nose dive. Although Boeing did not say it was the seat mechanism that caused the incident, it advised airlines to check the switches during maintenance as a “precautionary measure”.
