Successful evacuation from burning Japan Airlines jet highlights dogged devotion to safety

BANGKOK (AP) — The swift and safe evacuation of a Japan Airlines jet that caught fire after hitting a Coast Guard aircraft while it was landing Tuesday at Tokyo’s Haneda airport reflects a dogged dedication to safety and training by the airline, and hard experience from past disasters.

JAL set up a Safety Promotion Center at the airport in 2006 to reflect lessons learned from the Aug. 12, 1985, crash of Flight 123 into a mountain north of Tokyo. It was the world’s worst single-aircraft disaster, killing 520 people with only four survivors. JAL staff maintain a memorial at the site at Otsuka Ridge and new employees climb to it to pay their respects.

“In the face of the pain and grief of the bereaved families and public distrust in airline safety, we pledged we would never again allow such a tragic accident to occur,” the airline says on its website.

Only 17 people suffered slight injuries when fleeing the Airbus 350 via evacuation slides and running for their lives Tuesday evening as the plane blazed. Five people on the Japan Coast Guard’s Bombardier Dash-8 plane were killed and the pilot survived with serious injuries.

International aviation safety organizations use a 90-second benchmark for evacuating all passengers during emergency drills. Such drills must be done once a year and all crew members and flight attendants must pass the test, JAL spokesperson Keiko Miyoshi said.

Airline safety analysts credited the rapid evacuation of Tuesday’s flight to stringent training and passengers who heeded instructions and left their belongings behind.

A crash at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport in May 2019 illustrated the hazards of trying to bring bags along in an evacuation after a Sukhoi SSJ100 jet caught fire in a hard emergency