More than 50 passengers have filed a class action suit for compensation against South Korea’s No. 2 carrier Asiana Airlines over a crash landing in San Francisco, which killed three in 2013.
(AP)
Korean law firm Barun Law LLC filed the complaint on June 26 in the Seoul Central District Court on behalf of 53 plaintiffs -- 27 Korean, 25 Chinese and one Indian national who resides in Korea -- aboard Flight 214, which clipped a sea wall and slammed into a runway at the U.S. airport on July 6, 2013.
“The pilots failed to manage their speed and altitude while approaching to the airport. The passengers were seriously wounded as the pilots didn’t operate the autopilot flight director system and auto throttle properly,” reads the complaint.
They seek a total of 34.28 billion won ($30.5 million) in damages, claiming they suffered injuries including spinal damage and fractures as well as the emotional distress caused by the accident.
According to the complaint, the victims also asked the Seoul court to rule the amount of the compensatory damages based on California law where the accident occurred.
More than 180 of the 307 passengers and crew members aboard the Boeing 777 were injured in the crash.
In a separate case, Asiana settled with 72 passengers of the Flight 214 in March, the first settlement in connection with the crash, but dozens more filed in courts here and the U.S. remain unresolved.
In July last year, the National Transportation Safety Board -- the U.S. agency in charge of the crash investigation -- blamed the pilots’ for the mismanaged landing, saying they excessively relied on automated systems. They also cited the complexity of a key flight system on the Boeing 777 as a main cause for the fatal crash.
By Park Han-na (
hnpark@heraldcorp.com)