Asiana Airlines yesterday said it was offering an initial compensation payment worth US$10,000 to all surviving passengers on board a plane that crashed in San Francisco last month killing three people.
The South Korean airline recently started offering the cash to help the 288 surviving passengers meet urgent medical expenses and other needs before final compensation amounts are decided later, an Asiana spokeswoman said.
“This is a minimum payment we are offering for all passengers, regardless of whether they were injured or not,” she said, adding the amount will be deducted from the total compensation once it is decided.
Those who were relatively unharmed and whose final compensation may come to less than US$10,000 will still be allowed to keep the money, she said.
The latest offer is not a settlement and will not affect ongoing or future lawsuits filed by passengers, the spokeswoman added.
South Korea’s second-largest air carrier is faced with a horde of legal battles after the July 6 crash, which left three dead and about 180 injured.
The tail of the Boeing 777 passenger jet from Shanghai via Seoul broke off after clipping a seawall short of the runway, prompting the aircraft to skid out of control and catch fire.
Alongside 16 crew members the aircraft was carrying 291 passengers — many of them Chinese — and more than 120 of them escaped unharmed. The cause of the crash is under investigation by US aviation authorities.
A group of 83 passengers on board the flight filed a lawsuit last month seeking millions from Boeing and warned their claim may be expanded to include Asiana later.
Other groups of passengers have reportedly filed separate suits in the US.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
A top Vietnamese property tycoon was on Thursday sentenced to death in one of the biggest corruption cases in history, with an estimated US$27 billion in damages. A panel of three hand-picked jurors and two judges rejected all defense arguments by Truong My Lan, chair of major developer Van Thinh Phat, who was found guilty of swindling cash from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) over a decade. “The defendant’s actions ... eroded people’s trust in the leadership of the [Communist] Party and state,” read the verdict at the trial in Ho Chi Minh City. After the five-week trial, 85 others were also sentenced on
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of