Korean Air Lines Co., Ltd. (KAL; Korean: 주식회사 대한항공; RR: Jusikhoesa Daehan Hanggong), operating asKorean Air, is the flag carrier of South Korea and its largest airline based on fleet size, international destinations, and international flights. It is owned by the Hanjin Group.
The present-day Korean Air traces its history to March 1, 1969, when the Hanjin group acquired government-owned Korean Air Lines, which had operated since June 1962.[5] Korean Air is a founding member of SkyTeamalliance and SkyTeam Cargo. As of 2024, it is one of the 10 airlines ranked 5-star airline by Skytrax,[6] and the top 20 airlines in the world in terms of passengers carried and is also one of the top-ranked international cargo airlines.
Korean Air's international passenger division and related subsidiary cargo division together serve 126 cities in 44 countries. Its domestic division serves 13 destinations. The airline's global headquarters is located in Seoul, South Korea. The airline had approximately 20,540 employees as of December 2014.[7]
The airline was, around 1999, known as "an industry pariah, notorious for fatal crashes" due to its poor safety record and a large number of incidents and accidents.[8] The airline's reputation has significantly improved by 2009 as it has focused investment on improving its safety record including by hiring consultants from Boeing and Delta Air Lines.[9]
In 1962, government of the Republic of Korea acquired Korean National Airlines, which was founded in 1946, and changed its name to Korean Air Lines to become a state-owned airline. On 1 March 1969, the Hanjin Group acquired the state-owned airline and it is the beginning of Korean Air.[12][13] Long-haul trans-pacific freight operations were introduced on April 26, 1971, followed by passenger services to Los Angeles International Airport on April 19, 1972.[14]
Expansion
A Korean Air Boeing 707 at Fukuoka Airport in August 1987 with a previous livery. This aircraft is the only Boeing 707 ordered by Korean Air from Boeing, and destroyed in 1987 as Korean Air Flight 858.
Korean Air operated international flights to destinations such as Hong Kong, Japan, Taiwan, and Los Angeles with Boeing 707s until the introduction of the Boeing 747 in 1973. In that year, the airline introduced Boeing 747s on its trans-Pacific routes and started a European service to Paris, France using the 707 and then McDonnell Douglas DC-10. In 1975, the airline became one of the earliest Asian airlines to operate Airbus aircraft with the purchase of three Airbus A300s, which were put into immediate service on Asian routes.[15] In 1981, Korean Air opened its cargo terminal at Los Angeles International Airport.[12] Since South Korean aircraft were prohibited from flying in the airspace of North Korea and the Soviet Union at the time, the European routes had to be designed eastbound from South Korea, such as Seoul ~ Anchorage ~ Paris.
Change to 'Korean Air'
A blue-top, silver and redesigned livery with a new corporate "Korean Air" logo featuring a stylized Taegeuk design was introduced on March 1, 1984, and the airline's name changed to Korean Air from Korean Air Lines. This livery was introduced on its MD-80s and Boeing 747-300s. It was designed in cooperation between Korean Air and Boeing. In the 1990s, Korean Air became the first airline to use the new McDonnell Douglas MD-11 to supplement its new fleet of Boeing 747-400 aircraft; however, the MD-11 did not meet the airline's performance requirements and they were eventually converted to freighters. Some older 747 aircraft were also converted for freight service. In 1984, Korean Air's head office was in the KAL Building on Namdaemunno, Jung District, Seoul.[12][13][16]
Korean Air was once notorious for its abysmal safety record and high rate of fatal crashes.[17][18][19][20] In 1999, Korea's President Kim Dae-jung described the airline's safety record as "an embarrassment to the nation" and chose Korean Air's smaller rival, Asiana, for a flight to the United States.[21]
Between 1970 and 1999, Korean Air wrote off 16 aircraft due to serious incidents and accidents with the loss of over 700 lives.[22] In the case of Korean Air Flight 801, the National Transportation Safety Board unanimously concluded that the airline's inadequate pilot training contributed to the pilot error that caused the fatal crash.[23]
In 1999, Delta Air Lines suspended its code-sharing relationship with Korean Air explicitly citing its poor safety record following the fatal crash of Korean Air Cargo Flight 6316. It marked the first time safety was explicitly cited as the reason for stopping a major code-sharing alliance by an airline.[24] Other partners including Air Canada and Air France followed suit.
In 2001, the Federal Aviation Administration downgraded South Korea's aviation safety rating and blocked South Korean carriers from expanding into the United States after the country and its carriers failed to improve sufficiently following a warning the previous year.[25] The move was driven by the country's lax oversight of its carriers including Korean Air.[26]
The rating has since been restored as the airline invested billions of dollars to improve safety, upgrade its fleet, install new technology, and overhaul its corporate culture including hiring consultants from Boeing and Delta Air Lines.[9] In 2002, the New York Times noted that Korean Air had been removed from many "shun lists".[17]
On 5 June 2007, Korean Air said that it would create a new low-cost carrier called Jin Air in Korea to compete with Korea's KTX high-speed railway network system, which offered cheaper fares and less stringent security procedures compared to air travel. Jin Air started scheduled passenger service on July 17, 2008. Korean Air announced that some of its 737s and A300s would be given to Jin Air.
In mid-2010, a co-marketing deal with games company Blizzard Entertainment sent a 747-400 and a 737-900 taking to the skies wrapped in StarCraft II branding. In August 2010, Korean Air announced heavy second-quarter losses despite record-high revenue.[28]
In August 2010, Hanjin Group, the parent of KAL, opened a new cargo terminal at Navoiy International Airport in Uzbekistan, which will become a cargo hub with regular Seoul-Navoi-Milan flights.[29]
In 2019, Korean Air began playing a safety video with the K-pop group SuperM.[32] It featured the song "Let's go everywhere", which was to be released as a single.[33] The airline also featured the group on a livery sported by a Boeing 777-300ER, with registration HL8010.[34][35]
In 2023, Korean Air was certified a 5-star Airline by Skytrax, an air transport rating organization.[36]
Cho Hyun-Ah, also known as "Heather Cho", is the daughter of then-chairman Cho Yang-ho. She resigned from some of her duties in late 2014 after she ordered a Korean Air jet to return to the gate to allow a flight attendant to be removed from the aircraft. The attendant had served Cho nuts in a bag instead of on a plate. As a result of further fallout, Cho Hyun-Ah was later arrested by Korean authorities for violating South Korea's aviation safety laws.[37]
In March 2021, KAL announced the merger with Asiana Airlines will be delayed as foreign authorities have not approved the deal.[40][41] As of 2023, the deal has not been completed as essential countries have approached the deal with skepticism.[42]
Corporate affairs and identity
One of the airline's offices, the KAL building in Seoul
Ownership
Korean Air is owned by Hanjin Group and it is majority controlled by Hanjin KAL Corporation. The owner family of Hanjin Group is still the airline's largest and controlling, shareholder; Walter Cho, its current chairman and CEO, is the third generation of the family to lead the airline. As of 5 June 2020, Hanjin KAL holds 29.27% of Korean Air shares.[5]
Korean Air has been cited as one of the examples of the South Korean "chaebol" system, wherein corporate conglomerates, established with government support, overreach diverse branches of industry. For much of the time between the foundation of Korean Air as Korean National Airlines in 1946 and the foundation of Asiana Airlines in 1988, Korean Air was the only airline operating in South Korea.
The process of the sale of Korean National Airlines to Hanjin in 1969 was supported by Park Chung Hee, the South Korean military general president who seized power of the country through a military coup d'état; and the monopoly of the airline was secured for two decades.
After widening the chaebol branches, the subsidiary corporations of Korean Air include marine and overland transportation businesses, hotels, and real estate among others; and the previous branches included heavy industry, passenger transportation, construction, and a stockbroking business. The nature of the South Korean chaebol system involves nepotism. A series of incidents involving Korean Air in the 2000s have "revealed an ugly side of the culture within chaebols, South Korea's giant family-run conglomerates".[44]
Hotel ownership
Korean Air owns five hotels: two KAL hotels on Jeju island, the Hyatt in Incheon; Waikiki Resort in Hawaii, and a hotel/office building called the Wilshire Grand Tower in Los Angeles. This building in downtown Los Angeles houses the largest InterContinental Hotel in the Americas in what is the tallest building in Los Angeles.[45]
Korean Air Aerospace Division
Korean Air is also involved in aerospace research and manufacturing. The division, known as the Korean Air Aerospace Division (KAL-ASD), has manufactured licensed versions of the MD Helicopters MD 500 and Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters, as well as the Northrop F-5E/F Tiger II fighter aircraft,[46] the aft fuselage and wings for the KF-16 fighter aircraft manufactured by Korean Aerospace Industries and parts for various commercial aircraft including the Boeing 737, Boeing 747, Boeing 777 and Boeing 787 Dreamliner; and the Airbus A330 and Airbus A380.[47] In 1991, the division designed and flew the Korean Air Chang-Gong 91 light aircraft. KAA also provides aircraft maintenance support for the United States Department of Defense in Asia and maintains a research division with focuses on launch vehicles, satellites, commercial aircraft, military aircraft, helicopters, and simulation systems.[48]
In October 2012, a development deal between Bombardier Aerospace and a government-led South Korean consortium was announced, aiming to develop a 90-seat turbopropregional airliner, targeting a 2019 launch date. The consortium would have included Korea Aerospace Industries and Korean Air.[49] While this plan did not come to fruition, in 2019, Korean Aerospace Industries nevertheless decided to conduct a two-year study to assess the feasibility of taking the lead on building a turboprop airliner.[50]
Korean Air is also an airline partner of Skywards, the frequent-flyer program for Emirates. Skywards members can earn miles for flying Korean Air and can redeem miles for free flights.
Fleet
Current fleet
As of July 2024[update], Korean Air operates the following aircraft:[64][65][66]
At the Association of Asia Pacific Airlines Assembly in 2018, Korean Air announced that it was considering a new large widebody aircraft order to replace older Airbus A330, Boeing 747-400, Boeing 777-200ER and Boeing 777-300. Types under consideration for replacement of older widebody aircraft in the fleet include the Boeing 777X and Airbus A350 XWB.[91] At the International Air Transport Association Annual General Meeting (IATA AGM) in Seoul, Chairman Walter Cho said Korean Air's widebody order is imminent and it is considering an extra order of Airbus A220 Family including developing version, Airbus A220-500.[92]
In 2022, Korean Air was considering ordering a new freighter to continue the support cargo demand worldwide. Chairman of Korean Air Walter Cho said KAL is considering two options.[93][94]
Korean Air currently offers three types of first class, four types of business (Prestige) class, and standard economy class.[101] Korean Air operates First Class on all Boeing 747-8I and parts of its 777-300ER, Airbus A380-800, Boeing 777-200ER, and -300ER fleets. Some seats are equipped as suites with doors.[citation needed] The airline markets Business Class as "Prestige Class", with some aircraft equipped with suites.[citation needed] The airline announced its introduction of Premium Economy in 2017.[102] The first aircraft equipped with premium economy marketed as "Economy Plus" was CS300 (Airbus A220-300).[103] The product was eliminated in 2019 due to discordance of service and profit loss.[104][105] The airline also offers Economy Class.
In the late 1990s, Korean Air was "an industry pariah, notorious for fatal crashes" due to its extremely poor safety record and being one of the world's most dangerous airlines.[18][19][106] Safety has seemingly improved since as the airline made concerted efforts to improve standards in the early 21st century.[17] In 2001, the Federal Aviation Administration upgraded Korea's air-safety rating while Korean Air passed an International Air Transport Association audit in 2005.[106]
Between 1970 and 1999, many fatal incidents occurred. Since 1970, 17 Korean Air aircraft have been written off in serious incidents and accidents with the loss of 700 lives. Two Korean Air aircraft were shot down by the Soviet Union, one operating as Korean Air Lines Flight 902 and the other as Korean Air Lines Flight 007.
Korean Air's deadliest incident was Flight 007 which was shot down by the Soviet Union on September 1, 1983. All 269 people on board were killed, including a sitting U.S. Congressman, Larry McDonald.
In a 2023 "landmark decision", the state-affiliated Korea Worker's Compensation and Welfare Service ruled that the cancer death of a flight attendant was akin to an industrial accident. The plaintiff had flown for 25 years on routes to Europe and America, which exposed workers to more cosmic radiation because Earth's magnetic field is weaker over the North Pole. Korean Air said it monitors and limits individual radiation exposure to less than 6mSv a year. The plaintiff's attorney contends that the company uses an old measuring method. The ruling panel said that the method employed by Korean Air could have downplayed the extent of radiation exposure and that the flight attendant could have been exposed to over 100mSv of radiation.[117]
^ abSee Malcolm Gladwell, Outliers (2008), pp. 177–223 for a discussion of this turnaround in airline safety. Gladwell notes (p. 180) that the hull-loss rate for the airline was 4.79 per million departures, a full 17 times greater than United Airlines which at the same time had a loss rate of just 0.27 per million departures.
^ ab대한항공등 4개사, 다자간 운항동맹 스카이팀 결성 [Korean Air and 4 other companies form a sky team for a multilateral flight alliance]. Korea Economy News (in Korean). June 23, 2000. Archived from the original on February 14, 2021. Retrieved November 17, 2020.
^항공기 등록현황. Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport of Korea (in Korean). Archived from the original on September 29, 2020. Retrieved August 7, 2020.
^대한항공, '친환경 항공기' A321네오 도입…하늘길 확대 [Korean Air, introduces 'Eco-Frendly'aircraft, Airbus A321neo…expand its network] (in Korean). Financial News. October 31, 2022.
^[단독]대한항공, 전용기 추가 도입… 첫 고객으로 삼성과 계약 [[Exclusive] Korean Air Introduces Additional Private Jet... Engage Samsung as First Customer] (in Korean). Donga News. June 17, 2022.
^"연도별 도입 현황" [Annual introduction status]. Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport of the Republic of Korea (in Korean). Archived from the original on September 29, 2020. Retrieved August 7, 2020.
^"연도별 말소 현황" [Annual obliteration status]. Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport of the Republic of Korea (in Korean). Archived from the original on August 23, 2020. Retrieved August 7, 2020.
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