Article published on August 13th, 1985.

HEADLINE: 517 BELIEVED DEAD IN JAPAN AIR CRASH : JAL 747 DOWN NEAR TOKYO; AT LEAST 7 SURVIVE WORST SINGLE-PLANE DISASTER

TOKYO — A Japan Air Lines Boeing 747 jumbo jet carrying 524 people on a domestic flight crashed Monday in a mountainous area northwest of Tokyo after the pilot reported that a right rear door was “broken” and that he was “unable to control” the plane. Four survivors were found, a rescue party said today.

The crash was the worst single-plane disaster and the second-worst air disaster in aviation history.

Not until 11 hours after the crash did helicopters get a clear view of the crash site on a ridge of 6,929-foot Mt. Ogura, near the village of Kita Aikimura, 70 miles northwest of Tokyo. Cameramen aboard a helicopter owned by NHK, the semi-governmental radio and TV network, reported early today that there was no sign of life. Later, the first group of rescuers to reach the ground at the crash site reported finding two women, the 8-year-old daughter of one of them and a 12-year-old girl on the desolate, rain-swept mountain.

Television pictures from the site showed one of the girls, identified as 8-year-old Mikiko Yoshizaki, occasionally blinking, wrapped in firemen’s jackets and being lifted onto a stretcher to be flown out by helicopter.

The other survivors were identified as Mikiko’s mother, Hiroko, 35; the 12-year-old girl and Keiko Kawakami.

2 Found in Tail Section

The 12-year-old girl was traveling with her parents and her 7-year-old sister.

Two of the survivors were found in the tail section and two others in different parts of the wreckage.

All were taken by military helicopter to a hospital in Fujioka, 25 miles east of the crash site.

Hospital officials at one time had said there might be an additional three survivors, but this was later discounted. Police officials could confirm only four.

The plane, Japan Air Lines Flight 123, was flying from Tokyo’s Haneda Airport to the western city of Osaka when it crashed into the mountain, about 45 minutes after its 6:12 p.m. takeoff, authorities said. The 250-mile flight between Japan’s two largest cities normally takes an hour.

Nearly all the passengers were Japanese, the airline said, but there were 21 foreigners, including at least two Americans, on board.

Early today, a JAL spokesman said the airline received a telephone call from a man asserting that the radical Kakumaru-ha organization had sabotaged the plane. Kakumaru-ha, a name meaning “the Revolutionary Faction,” has been harassing Tokyo’s international airport at Narita since its construction began in the late 1960s. There was no confirmation that the caller represented the political group.

TV cameras showed that the plane cut a swath through a forest on the top of the ridge and apparently exploded into hundreds of fragments. The only recognizable portions of the plane were parts of the wings, on which the letters “JAL” were visible, and crumpled sections of the fuselage bearing twisted window panes.

Billowing Smoke

At what appeared to be the point of impact, the earth was blackened and bare. More than 12 hours after the crash, smoke billowed hundreds of feet into the air. Burnt tree trunks were left standing nearby. Portions of the tail of the aircraft lay in a dry river bed thousands of feet below the ridge.

About 14 hours after the crash, about 70 paratroops of the Self-Defense Force, the Japanese military, were lowered by rope to the crash site from helicopters. Other ground rescue parties, including a main body of 700 Ground Self-Defense Force troops, still had not arrived at the scene early today.

Police said they hope to have a total of 6,000 rescuers on the mountain this afternoon.

A television network reported that at least 30 bodies were found. A makeshift morgue was set up in a gymnasium in the neighboring town of Fujioka.

The crash site is crisscrossed by deep valleys covered with fir and spruce trees and has few access roads. It is difficult to penetrate even on foot.

JAL officials disclosed today that the plane was carrying radioactive isotopes for medical use. Scientists of the Japan Isotopes Assn. said, however, that the radioactive level in the isotopes is too low to pose a threat to health unless a person is exposed to them for a long time.

The 530-seat jumbo jet, like all aircraft used on domestic routes in Japan, was equipped entirely with economy-class seats and carried 509 passengers, including 12 infants, and a crew of 15. This is the season of Obon, when Japanese traditionally visit their birthplaces and honor their ancestors, and the plane was booked to near-capacity.

Passengers’ Names

Television stations in Tokyo spent hour after hour Monday night solemnly reading the names on the passenger list, ranging from 80-year-old retirees to babies carried on parents’ laps.

Hundreds of relatives of passengers gathered late Monday at a hotel near the airport to await word. JAL President Yasumoto Takagi visited the families, bowed and told them: “I am very sorry. I humbly apologize to you all.” Early today, Takagi, his voice cracking, again apologized in a news conference.

Among the passengers was singer Kyu Sakamoto, 43, whose song “Ue o Mite Aruko” (“Let’s Walk Looking Upward”) topped the hit parade in the United States in 1963 under the title “Sukiyaki.” It was the only Japanese-language song ever to become a top hit in the United States.

Also aboard was Ikuo Uragami, president of the House Food Corp., one of Japan’s largest manufacturers of processed food. The company last year was subjected to an extortion attempt by still-unknown persons who threatened to poison its products on grocery shelves if it refused to pay a ransom.

Baseball President

Hajimu Nakano, 63, president of the Hanshin Tigers baseball team of Osaka, also was aboard.

The two American victims were identified as Edward A. Anderson, 48, and Michael Hanson, 40, both employees of Stearns Catalytic World Corp., a Denver-based engineering and construction firm employing about 3,500 people.

A spokesman for the firm said that Anderson had worked for the company 10 years and was manager of international business development. Hanson, a 12-year veteran of the firm, worked as manager of its electronics department.

The two were in Japan on business, the spokesman said, but declined to comment further.

A Ministry of Transportation official said that the plane’s pilot, Capt. Masami Takahama, 49, radioed Tokyo air controllers in Tokorozawa at 6:25 p.m., 13 minutes after takeoff, asking for instructions to turn back and, at the same time, pushing an emergency signal button.

The air controllers told Takahama to fly due east and asked if he had an emergency. “It’s an emergency,” he responded at 6:27 p.m. The radar screens then showed that the plane began to fly west, in the opposite direction from the instructions given the pilot.

Pilot’s Messages

At 6:41 p.m., Takahama reported: “We have discovered the cause of the trouble. The right rear door is broken. Will make an emergency landing.”

JAL officials said later that the “broken” door could have caused a sudden drop in cabin pressure but said that the pilot made no specific mention of pressure in his conversations with air controllers.

Aviation experts told the Kyodo news agency that damage to the door could not of itself have caused the crash. Despite a loss of cabin pressure, the plane would have been able to continue flying for some time, they said.

JAL President Takagi declined at the press conference to speculate on the cause of the crash. He said, however, that it was “almost unimaginable” that a cabin door malfunction could have caused the crash.

“We are looking carefully into the possibility of negligence in preparing the flight,” he said.

At 6:46 p.m., Takahama radioed that he was “unable to control” the plane. He was asked if he wanted to land at Haneda and shouted, “Yes, please proceed with that!”

At 6:54 p.m., the pilot said that he did not know his position and asked for help. Air controllers informed him that his aircraft was located 50 miles northwest of Tokyo. “Understood,” Takahama replied.

The controllers then told Takahama that both Haneda Airport and a U.S. air base at Yokota, 21 miles west of Tokyo, had been cleared for an emergency landing. But there was no reply, and the plane disappeared from radar screens at 6:57 p.m. at an altitude of about 10,000 feet.

12,404 Flying Hours

Takahama had logged 12,404 hours flying time since joining the airline in 1966, JAL officials said.

Radar readings showed that the aircraft followed its planned southwest course until shortly after flying over the Izu Peninsula. It then suddenly turned 90 degrees to the right, or to the northwest. When it disappeared from radar screens, it was making a left turn to the west.

Witnesses on the ground reported seeing a trail of white smoke emerging from the plane as it fell.

The plane left 12 minutes behind schedule, but a movie film of the aircraft taking off from Haneda Airport taken by an amateur photographer showed nothing unusual. After the crash, the film was shown on NHK, the TV network.

The plane, a 747-SR (for short-range), an aircraft modified for short takeoff and landing, was purchased in 1974, JAL officials said. It had been operated for about 25,000 hours.

Door ‘Seldom Used’

JAL officials reported early today that the right rear door was “seldom used” during normal ground stops. A JAL mechanic also reported that he had checked the door in question before takeoff and found no abnormality.

Previously, the highest death toll in an accident involving a single aircraft occurred in 1974, when a Turkish Airlines DC-10 crashed near Paris, killing 346 people. The highest number of fatalities in a single accident occurred in 1977, when a KLM Boeing 747 collided with a taxiing Pan Am 747 on the ground at Tenerife, in the Canary Islands, off northwest Africa, killing 582 people.

Japan’s worst previous air crash was the collision in the air of a domestic All Nippon Airways Boeing 727 and a military aircraft in July, 1971, killing 162. JAL suffered its last previous accident in 1982, when a pilot, later judged to have been suffering a mental illness, intentionally tried to crash a plane while landing at Haneda Airport. The plane crashed in Tokyo Bay, killing 24 and injuring 149.