Runway Approach 'Not Normal' in Japan Crash: Asiana Airlines

Asiana Airlines said Thursday a plane accident that injured more than 20 people at a Japanese airport made an abnormal runway approach.

Akiyoshi Yamamura, vice-president of the South Korean carrier, made a public apology at a press conference at Hiroshima airport, where 27 people were hurt when the plane smashed into a communications antenna as it came in to land.

"I express a deep apology for those who were affected by the accident," he said. "We have received a report that the plane approached the runway at an extremely low altitude, which led to the accident."

"As for the angle (of approach), it was not normal," he said.

Flight OZ162 from Incheon, near Seoul, to western Hiroshima was carrying 73 passengers and eight crew when it smashed into the localiser -- a large gate-like structure, six metres (20 feet) high, that sits around 300 metres (yards) from the start of the runway.

Transport officials from Japan and South Korea were investigating the accident on Thursday, but no final report has been published. Suggestions also emerged that a sudden down draft may have played a part in the crash.

Initially the South Korean carrier said 18 passengers had been hurt, but later corrected the figure.

Tuesday's accident had echoes of an Asiana flight that crashed in San Francisco in July 2013, killing three people and leaving 182 injured.

US investigators concluded that a mismanaged landing approach in a highly automated cockpit was the probable cause of the accident, in which a Boeing 777 clipped a sea wall with its landing gear and then crashed and burst into flames.