[Aircraft Crash] "How Can We Console the Grief of Victims and Their Families?"

■ At the Gwangju Yeongnak Park Funeral Site
Gwangju City Sets Up 'Special Mortuary Room'
Separate Spaces for Families and Colleagues
No Bereaved Families Have Requested Placement Yet

Handwritten Letter Mourning the Victims. Yonhap News

"How can we possibly comfort the victims who lost their lives so suddenly and the grief of their families?"

On the 2nd, at Room 58 on the 3rd floor of Memorial Hall 2 at Gwangju Yeongnak Park, a separate resting place was prepared for the victims of the Jeju Air passenger plane disaster.

This measure was taken after the bereaved families of the victims requested Gwangju Mayor Kang Gijung on the 31st of last month, "Please prepare a separate resting place so that the victims who perished together with their families or colleagues are not scattered here and there."

So far, it has been confirmed that no bereaved families have requested to place their loved ones at Yeongnak Park. The city initially planned to assign a dedicated staff member to support the funeral process for each application. The operating hours were also extended by two hours, from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m., and a total of 55 cremation furnaces are in operation per day.

An official from Yeongnak Park said, "By this morning, one cremation will be conducted, and two more will be held in the afternoon. Among those in the afternoon, the bereaved family of a woman from Thailand decided to take the urn to her hometown after cremation."

A citizen who visited the joint incense altar at the May 18 Democracy Plaza the previous day said, "How can we possibly comfort the victims who lost their lives so suddenly and the grief of their families? I sincerely hope that such a disaster will never happen again," as they put their hands together in prayer.

Memorial guide posted at Yeongnak Park in Gwangju. Photo by Bohyun Song

Meanwhile, this accident occurred at 9:03 a.m. on the 29th of last month, when Jeju Air flight 7C 2216, departing from Bangkok, Thailand and heading to Muan International Airport, attempted a belly landing due to a landing gear malfunction and collided with a concrete embankment at the end of the runway. Out of 181 passengers, 179 died and only two crew members were rescued, marking it as the deadliest aviation disaster in South Korea in terms of casualties.

The identities of all 179 victims were confirmed on the 1st. By region, there were 85 victims from Gwangju, 71 from Jeonnam, 6 from Jeonbuk, 4 from Gyeonggi Province, 3 from Seoul, 2 from Jeju Island, 1 from Gyeongnam, and 1 from Thailand.

The government is providing emergency medical support, funeral and psychological support for the bereaved families, and has set up an accident response headquarters to investigate the exact cause of the accident.