Southeast New Airport Promotion Committee: "The Gimhae Airport Expansion Plan Is Not Fair"

Serious Safety Issues at Gimhae Airport... Objective Verification Needed
Currently, Two Advisory Committee Members Who Drafted the 'Gimhae Expansion Plan' Participate in the Verification Committee

Gimhae Airport runway. [Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Yeongnam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Kim Yong-woo] The Southeast Gateway Airport Promotion Committee announced on the 3rd that it has requested Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun to ensure that the Prime Minister’s Office Verification Committee conducts a fair and objective verification of the appropriateness of the Gimhae Airport expansion plan.

The Promotion Committee strongly raised concerns about fairness, noting that two experts who participated as advisors during the preparation of the basic plan for the Gimhae Airport expansion are currently serving as members of the Prime Minister’s Office’s “Gimhae New Airport Verification Committee.”

According to the petition, the Prime Minister’s Office initially stated that the verification committee would be composed of experts with no vested interests in the Gimhae Airport expansion plan to conduct an objective and independent verification. The inclusion of personnel affiliated with the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport (MOLIT) from the outset of the committee’s formation raised concerns that this was intended to suppress the earnest pleas of the residents of the Busan, Ulsan, and Gyeongnam (Bu-Ul-Gyeong) region and favor MOLIT’s position.

Furthermore, in light of recent safety concerns regarding MOLIT’s Gimhae New Airport expansion plan, the fact that the verification committee has accepted three patchwork revision proposals submitted by MOLIT was clearly stated to violate the original purpose of verifying the appropriateness of the existing MOLIT plan.

Heo Yong-do, Chairman of the Busan Chamber of Commerce and Industry, strongly requested that “since the current Gimhae Airport expansion plan contains serious, insurmountable safety defects that an airport must absolutely meet, the Prime Minister’s Office should reject MOLIT’s unreasonable demands for revision reviews and promptly announce the verification results.”

Chairman Heo added, “The safety of the public can never be compromised in airport construction. Given that Gimhae Airport carries the painful history of the 2002 Dotaesan China Civil Aviation crash, the newly constructed Bu-Ul-Gyeong new airport must guarantee an even higher level of safety.”

A representative of the Southeast Gateway Airport Promotion Committee explained, “This petition urges the Prime Minister’s Office Verification Committee to promptly complete the verification process without further compromising fairness in the construction of the new airport, which reflects the hopes of the Bu-Ul-Gyeong residents, and requests support to ensure that a proper Bu-Ul-Gyeong new airport can be built as soon as possible.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.