[Asiana Airlines. Photo Credit to Pixabay]

The emergency door of an Asiana Airlines plane was opened during a flight last Friday.

At 11:49 am on the 26th of May, a passenger plane of Asiana Plane departed from Jeju International Airport to Daegu International Airport.

Right before landing, at 12:45 pm, the gate of the plane was opened.

The plane was still 700 feet from the ground with the speed of 170 miles an hour.

On this OZ8124 flight, there were 194 passengers in total, where some of them experienced breathing problems or even fainted.

According to the passengers’ report, a passenger sitting near the gate had went up to the gate and turned its lever.

One passenger told Yonhap, “It was chaos with people close to the door appearing to faint one by one and flight attendants calling out for doctors on board through broadcasting.”

This passenger added on by stating “I thought the plane was blowing up. I thought I was going to die like this.”

The plane had eventually landed on the runway with its gate opened.

Asiana Airline spokesman, Baek Hyunwoo, stated “Normally when a plane is mid-flight, the difference in air pressure inside and outside the cabin prevents the doors from opening. But the plane was so close to the ground that the difference was negligible, allowing the door to be unlatched.”

Moreover, even the closest flight attendant was not sitting close to the gate enough to stop the man, when the man started opening up the gate.

Also, since all the passengers and flight attendants must wear safety belts during landing, which was the moment when the door was opened.

The man was arrested upon landing, with the charges of violating aviation security laws, and is currently being investigated.

Meanwhile, the plane gate is the only way for the passengers and flight crews to evacuate when landing in an emergency.

The passengers would evacuate by opening up the gate and go on the unfolded slide to the ocean or on the land.

Because of this importance, seats in front of the plane gate are only allowed to “healthy adults” who are capable of providing help to flight attendants in emergency situations.

Passengers sitting on these seats get educated and informed with necessary information or knowledge before take off and they are required to put their possessions on the shelf on top of the seats.

Also, all passengers are stipulated by law of operating the gate lever.

In this case, the Asiana Airline passenger plane had a plastic cover on the gate lever, and was made to open up the cover and turn the lever, in order to open the gate.

All airline models have slight differences, but mostly they do not have the complicated steps required when opening the gate.

However, at over a certain altitude, it is impossible opening the plane’s gate while flying.

As stated by the spokesman, this is due to the pressure difference between the outside and inside of the plane.

However, like this recent situation, it is possible opening the gate, when the pressure difference is lessened when the plane is near the ground.

In fact, there were points being made where locking devices should be reinforced, so that only captains or craft crews are able to open the gate.

However, the airline companies had been arguing that this can sometimes worsen the situation.

They had argued that problems such as technical issues or none of the crews available can possibly happen. And these situations could lead the passengers not being able to evacuate since they are not aware of the way they should be unlocking the gate.