A passenger opened an emergency exit door during a plane flight in South Korea on Friday, triggering an air explosion inside the cabin and slightly injuring 12 people, authorities said.
The plane, which was traveling from the southern island of Jeju to the southeastern city of Daegu, landed safely.
Some people on board the Asiana Airlines Airbus A321 plane tried to stop the person, who was able to partially open the door, the Ministry of Transport said.
An airline official said a man in his 30s, who was sitting in the emergency seat, appeared to have opened the door when the plane was about 700 feet (213 meters) above the ground and about two to three minutes away. landing in the city. located 240 kilometers south of Seoul.
The man was detained by airport police on suspicion of violating the aviation security law, a ministry statement said. His identity and motive were not immediately released.
They said he confessed to opening the door, but did not say why he did it.
The law prohibits passengers from tampering with departure doors and other equipment on board and provides for penalties of up to 10 years in prison, the ministry said.
A total of 200 people were on board the roughly hour-long flight, including 194 passengers, according to Asiana Airlines.
A video apparently taken by a person on board that was posted on social media shows the hair of some passengers being whipped around by air blowing into the cabin through the open door.
The passengers included teenage athletes on their way to a track meet.
Some screamed and cried in panic, the Yonhap news agency reported, citing their unnamed coach.
Yonhap quoted other passengers as saying they suffered severe ear pain after the door was opened. He said some cabin crew yelled for passengers’ help to prevent the door from opening.
Twelve people were taken to hospitals for treatment, according to the Ministry of Transport.
Emergency officials in Daegu said the injured suffered respiratory problems and other minor symptoms.
Aviation expert Geoffrey Thomas of Airline Ratings described the incident as “very strange”.
“Technically, it’s not possible to open those doors in flight,” he told CNN.
Thomas pointed out that the landing speed of an A321 is about 150 knots (278 km/h), which means that winds of that speed are passing the plane. The door, behind the wing of the plane, opened to that draft, he said.
“It seems unlikely that the door could have been opened first and then against the technically impossible draft, but one way or another it happened,” Thomas said.
The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport said it had sent an air safety supervisor to the site to check if there were any anomalies in the maintenance of the aircraft.
