Berliner Tageblatt - Families mourn 40 years since deadly Japan Airlines crash

On August 12, 1985, the doomed Boeing 747 was around 40 minutes into an hour-long flight from Tokyo to Osaka, when it crashed into a mountain about 120 kilometres (75 miles) northwest of the capital.

Tuesday saw hundreds of people -- including bereaved families and friends -- hike the trails up to the cenotaph erected on Mount Osutaka where the jet crashed.

Among them was a woman who lost her younger brother in the accident.

"I want to tell him that all of his family members are alive, with his soul on our shoulders", she told broadcaster Fuji TV.

"We're doing our best to live our lives".

Japan Airlines Flight 123 lost control soon after take-off, with a loud noise heard about 10 minutes into the trip and an emergency declared, before shaking violently and crashing.

The plane was almost full, with many holidaymakers flying back to their hometowns during Japan's "obon" mid-summer festival.

In the end, 505 passengers -- including a dozen infants -- and 15 crew members perished. Just four passengers survived.

Imperfect repairs to the aircraft's rear bulkhead by Boeing engineers seven years earlier -- coupled with JAL's subsequent lack of oversight -- were blamed for the accident.

Numerous, tiny cracks on the bulkhead -- unnoticed on prior flights -- burst, destroying a tail fin, rupturing hydraulic systems and sending the plane hurtling downward.

The world's worst airline disaster was the 1977 runway collision of two 747s on Tenerife in the Canary Islands that left 583 dead.

More recently in Japan, a near-catastrophic collision occurred at Haneda airport between a Japan Airlines aircraft and a smaller coast guard plane in January 2024.

All 379 people on board the JAL Airbus escaped just before the aircraft was engulfed in flames, but five of the six people on the smaller aircraft died.

D.Schneider--BTB