Jan. 3 (UPI) — The Japan Transport Safety Board on Wednesday launched a probe into the deadly collision between a Coast Guard plane and a Japan Airlines passenger plane.
The agency said it had inspected the scene of the incident at Tokyo’s Haneda International Airport and had the flight and voice recorders of the Coast Guard plane but was still looking for the components of the passenger plane which burst into flames on the runway.
Safety board officials said the investigation will focus on the instructions given by air traffic controllers to pilots before the crash.
“We cannot give a clear answer at this time as to why they collided,” said Takuya Fujiwara, an aviation accident investigator. “We will investigate what we can and finalize our report.”
The Coast Guard pilot, who was the lone survivor of six crew members on the aircraft, said he had received permission to take off from air-traffic controllers, The Asahi Shimbun reported.
Meanwhile JAL officials told reporters that they understood the JAL Airbus A350 “had received permission to land.”
Japan’s Transport Ministry said that according to communication records, the Japan Coast Guard airplane, which was delivering emergency goods to earthquake-hit areas, had not been given permission to enter the runway where the crash occurred.
The Metropolitan Police in Tokyo also inspected the scene as part of its own probe in connection with the charge of suspicion of professional negligence.
Five of the six Coast Guard crew members, who were delivering relief goods to the earthquake-affected area of Ishikawa, were killed in the crash. All 367 passengers and 12 crew members, though, managed to escape with serious injury from the JAL carrier.
