U.S. and Japan change safety regulations after runway accidents

[Anchor]

Now, let's take a look at the cases in the United States and Japan.

In the United States, regulations were changed to require that all structures within the safety zone around the runway be made of breakable materials, following an accident that occurred 25 years ago.

Reporter Wi Jae-cheon has the story.

[Report]

The passenger plane suffered severe damage, showing its interior clearly.

One wing is broken, and the fuselage is split into three parts.

On June 1, 1999, at Little Rock Airport in Arkansas, American Airlines Flight 1420 attempted to land amid a storm.

It barely touched down on the runway but lost control and veered off, crashing into a metal structure pillar located over a hundred meters beyond the end of the runway.

The accident resulted in 11 fatalities and over a hundred injuries.

[John Merriman/Survivor of the accident: "As the plane crashed upon landing, it went off an enbankment, went off a cliff, kind of an embankment there, broke into three pieces and burst into flame. "]

The Federal Aviation Administration subsequently designated a safety zone extending 305 meters from the end of the runway and 152 meters alongside the runway.

It mandated that all structures within this safety zone must be capable of breaking or collapsing.

This is to avoid the worst-case scenario in the event of a collision with an aircraft.

In 2015, an Asiana Airlines passenger plane that made an emergency landing at Hiroshima Airport in Japan veered off the runway and struck a localizer, but there were only minor injuries and no explosions.

The localizer that the aircraft passed through still bore the shape of the plane.

A Marine Corps base in San Diego, where a localizer was installed on a mound, flattened the ground three years ago and built structures using aluminum materials to minimize impact during a collision.

This is KBS News, Wi Jae-cheon.