The Jeju Air commercial plane that crashed in South Korea on Dec. 29 is covered by Samsung Fire & Marine Insurance, along with four other insurers, while AXA XL is its primary reinsurance provider, the airline said in a statement.
The policy cover includes liability insurance coverage of up to $1 billion per accident for a policy running from May 1, 2024, to April 30, 2025.
Flight 2216 was landing at Muan International Airport in South Korea from Bangkok, Thailand, on Sunday, with 181 people on board, six of whom were crew members.
According to the airline, the plane, which was a Boeing 737-800 aircraft, made a fuselage landing when its landing gear apparently failed to deploy after the pilot reported a bird strike to air traffic control. The plane allegedly deviated from the end of the runway and crashed into the outer wall of the airport, bursting into flames.
Only two crew members survived the crash, while all passengers were killed.
Samsung Fire & Marine, as well as AXA XL did not immediately respond to Best’s requests for comment.
Samsung Fire & Marine is the insurance subsidiary of Samsung Group. Its portfolio includes automobile insurance, long-term insurance, general insurance and annuities. AXA XL, a subsidiary of insurance giant AXA, offers property and casualty global commercial insurance to enterprises of various sizes.
South Korean authority launched a probe on Jeju Air, as well as the country’s entire airline operations following the event, with a team of US investigators assisting local authorities.
Earlier this week, Jeju Air reduced the number of its flights by up to 15%. Its chief executive, Kim E-bae, has also been banned from leaving South Korea amid the investigation.
South Korea’s transport ministry earlier said that they had already extracted the data from one of the plane’s black boxes. The data will be converted into an audio file, while a second black box – a flight data recorder – will be transported to the US for analysis.
