2024 turned out to be one of the worst years for aviation since the Boeing 737 Max crashes in 2018. On Christmas Day, Azerbaijan Airlines 8243 crashed after a series of failed attempts to land a crippled aircraft near Aktau airport in Kazakhstan, reportedly damaged by anti-aircraft weapons near their intended destination of Grozny, Russia. 38 out of 67 souls were lost.
Four days later, Jeju Air 2216 experienced a bird strike as they arrived at their destination airport of Muan, Korea. After declaring "mayday", the aircraft skidded down the runway with no landing gears, eventually overshooting and crashing into a concrete embankment just beyond the runway's edge. Of the 181 people onboard, only two survived the inferno that followed.
In the days since, one particular topic has gripped the public imagination: Why was such a solid wall placed at the end of Muan airport’s runway? Without it, might more lives have been spared in an otherwise intact landing? This 2-meter-high, 4-meter-thick concrete embankment serves to elevate an array of antennas used during aircraft landing, while also keeping them level on sloped land. Pilots familiar with the airport admitted they’d long mistaken the wall for a harmless dirt pile, its deadly potential hidden in plain sight.
Such "what ifs" do not bring comfort to the grieving families, and we shouldn't speculate answers in the midst of ongoing investigations. However, it did spark a review by our Ministry of Transport, which concluded that no such obstacles are present in Singapore.
This brings me to what I’ve come to call the “Muan Wall Event”—an intervention so effective at fulfilling its narrow purpose that it inadvertently generates unnecessary greater harm in its process. This differs from a black swan event, in which the high-impact incident is unexpected and difficult to prepare for, yet subsequently appears obvious on hindsight. Runway excursions such as this Jeju Air crash remain the most common landing accidents.
Here's an example of a Muan Wall Event closer to home, first pointed out by lao ban niang (thank you!).
During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, one of the local children's hospital faced an unprecedented surge of infected patients. To safeguard members of the public as well as others in the children's emergency department, the hospital erected a large tent outside to treat infected patients and installed security barricades to restrict access, minimizing the risk of cross-infection.
One night, a mother drove her unconscious child to the hospital, but instead of stopping at the hidden children’s emergency, she drove past it and instead arrived at the "more prominently lit" Urgent O&G Centre on the opposite side of the building. A nurse rushed the child using a wheelchair back towards the emergency department. By then, precious time had been lost.
Right after that unfortunate incident, the hospital swiftly rectified the wayfinding issues, and replaced the barricades with a manned security post.
Muan Wall Events reflect the many variations of booby-traps lurking in plain sight. Due to its inherent safety features and justifications, the potential for harm is easily downplayed and taken less seriously. The paradox lies in their origins—well-intentioned measures, backed by sound reasoning, that inadvertently create conditions for preventable tragedies. Muan Wall Events remind us that the pursuit of safety requires not only diligence but also humility and systems thinking: a recognition that even the most carefully engineered interventions, when crafted in isolation, can carry hidden risks.
Do you know of other Muan Wall Events, or one that's waiting to happen?
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