Korean Air Lines flight to Sydney diverts back to Incheon with overheating engine

A Korean Air Lines flight to Sydney diverted to Incheon on Sunday night due to problems in the aircraft’s engine.

A person walks past a Korean Air Lines logo. [YONHAP]

A Korean Air Lines flight to Sydney diverted to Incheon on Sunday night due to problems in the aircraft’s engine.

The carrier’s KE401 flight, which left Incheon for Sydney at 7:40 p.m. on Sunday, diverted back to Incheon International Airport after the aircraft got an alert that the engine was overheating. The aircraft landed back at Incheon not even an hour later at 8:18 p.m.

A total of 271 passengers and 12 flight crew were onboard. The carrier said there was no one injured.

According to Korean Air Lines, it is looking into whether there was a problem with the aircraft’s engine, but clarified that the engine did not catch fire.

The passengers that flew back to Incheon boarded a separate Korean Air Lines flight to Sydney a few hours later at 11:10 p.m., landing at the airport at 9:30 a.m. Monday.

This is the fourth accident involving a Korean Air Lines flight this year, with the latest incident happening on Oct. 23 when the carrier’s flight over ran a runway while trying to land at Mactan-Cebu International Airport. No one was injured, but the aircraft’s belly and nose were damaged.

Another accident happened on Sept. 29, with a flight bound for Heathrow striking the tail of an Icelandair’s aircraft.

The carrier’s flight taking off from Istanbul, Türkiye, made an emergency landing in Heydar Aliyev International Airport in Azerbaijan due to an engine malfunction on July 10.

BY LEE TAE-HEE [lee.taehee2@joongang.co.kr]