Former Jets offensive tackle Mekhi Becton agrees to 1-year deal with Eagles, agent says

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Former Jets offensive tackle Mekhi Becton agrees to 1-year deal with Eagles, agent says

2024-04-29 10:19 Last Updated At：10:50

Former New York Jets offensive tackle Mekhi Becton has agreed to terms with the Philadelphia Eagles on a one-year contract worth up to $5.5 million, agent Alan Herman told The Associated Press on Sunday night.

The contract is pending a physical, according to Herman.

ESPN first reported that Becton plans to join the Eagles, who needed some depth on their offensive line behind left tackle Jordan Mailata and right tackle Lane Johnson after backup Jack Driscoll signed with Miami as a free agent last month and Philadelphia didn’t draft any tackles over the weekend.

Becton was the 11th overall pick in the 2020 draft by the Jets out of Louisville and was expected to be a long-term anchor of New York’s offensive line. Knee injuries hampered his development after a solid rookie season.

The 6-foot-7 Becton started 16 games last season for the Jets, but New York didn’t pick up the fifth-year option on his rookie deal and allowed him to become a free agent.

The Jets revamped their offensive line this offseason, signing veteran Tyron Smith to a one-year deal worth up to $20 million to be their left tackle and trading for Morgan Moses to play on the right side. They also drafted Penn State left tackle Olu Fashanu with the No. 11 pick – the same spot at which Becton was taken – last Thursday night.

Becton injured his right knee in the 2021 regular-season opener against Carolina and needed arthroscopic surgery – and he didn’t play in another game that year. He came back for training camp the following summer and was set to play right tackle, but injured the same knee during practice and needed major surgery.

After weighing at least 400 pounds at one point, Becton lost weight during his rehabilitation and was down to a svelte 350 — the lightest he has been since his college days at Louisville – during training camp last summer. He was set to play right tackle, but moved back to the left side when Duane Brown was injured early in the season.

Becton will now work closely with Eagles offensive line coach Jeff Stoutland, who has overseen one of the NFL’s best O-lines over the past several years.

AP Pro Football Writer Rob Maaddi contributed to this report.

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Plane burst into flames after skidding off runway at an airport in South Korea, killing at least 167

2024-12-29 16:52 Last Updated At：17:00

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — A passenger plane burst into flames Sunday after it skidded off a runway at a South Korean airport and slammed into a concrete fence when its front landing gear apparently failed to deploy, killing at least 167 people, officials said, in one of the country’s worst aviation disasters.

The National Fire Agency said rescuers raced to pull people from the Jeju Air passenger plane carrying 181 people at the airport in the town of Muan, about 290 kilometers (180 miles) south of Seoul. The Transport Ministry said the plane was a 15-year-old Boeing 737-800 jet that was returning from Bangkok and that the crash happened at 9:03 a.m. local time.

At least 167 people — 79 men, 77 women and 11 others whose genders weren’t immediately identifiable — died in the fire, the fire agency said. The death toll is expected to rise further as the rest of the people aboard the plane remain missing about six hours after the incident.

Emergency workers pulled out two people, both crew members, to safety, and local health officials said they remain conscious. The fire agency deployed 32 fire trucks and several helicopters to contain the fire. About 1,560 firefighters, police officers, soldiers and other officials were also sent to the site, it said.

Footage of the crash aired by South Korean television channels showed the Jeju Air plane skidding across the airstrip at high speed, apparently with its landing gear still closed, overrunning the runway and colliding head-on with a concrete wall on the outskirts of the facility, triggering an explosion. Other local TV stations aired footage showing thick plumes of black smoke billowing from the plane, which was engulfed in flames.

Lee Jeong-hyeon, chief of the Muan fire station, told a televised briefing that the plane was completely destroyed, with only the tail assembly remaining recognizable among the wreckage. Lee said that workers were looking into various possibilities about what caused the crash, including whether the aircraft was struck by birds, Lee said.

Transport Ministry officials later said their early assessment of communication records show the airport control tower issued a bird strike warning to the plane shortly before it intended to land and gave its pilot permission to land in a different area. The pilot sent out a distress signal shortly before the plane went past the runway and skidded across a buffer zone before hitting the wall, the officials said.

Senior Transport Ministry official Joo Jong-wan said workers have retrieved the flight data and cockpit voice recorders of the plane’s black box, which will be examined by government experts investigating the cause of the crash and fire. Joo said the runway at the Muan airport will be closed until Jan. 1.

Emergency officials in Muan said the plane’s landing gear appeared to have malfunctioned.

The Transport Ministry said the plane’s passengers include two Thai nationals.

Thailand’s prime minister, Paetongtarn Shinawatra, expressed deep condolences to the families of those affected by the accident in a post on social platform X. Paetongtarn said she ordered the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to provide assistance immediately.

Kerati Kijmanawat, the director of the Airports of Thailand, confirmed in a statement that Jeju Air flight 7C 2216 departed from Suvarnabhumi Airport with no reports of abnormal conditions with the aircraft or on the runway.

Jeju Air in a statement expressed its “deep apology” over the crash and said it will do its “utmost to manage the aftermath of the accident.”

In a televised news conference, Kim E-bae, Jeju Air’s president, deeply bowed with other senior company officials as he apologized to bereaved families and said he feels “full responsibility” for the incident. Kim said the company hadn’t identified any mechanical problems with the aircraft following regular checkups and that he would wait for the results of government investigations into the cause of the incident.

Family members wailed as officials announced the names of some victims at a lounge in the Muan airport.

Boeing said in a statement on X it was in contact with Jeju Air and is ready to support the company in dealing with the crash.

“We extend our deepest condolences to the families who lost loved ones, and our thoughts remain with the passengers and crew,” Boeing said.

It’s one of the deadliest disasters in South Korea’s aviation history. The last time South Korea suffered a large-scale air disaster was in 1997, when a Korean Airline plane crashed in Guam, killing 228 people on board. In 2013, an Asiana Airlines plane crash-landed in San Francisco, killing three and injuring approximately 200.

Sunday’s accident was also one of the worst landing mishaps since a July 2007 crash that killed all 187 people on board and 12 others on the ground when an Airbus A320 slid off a slick airstrip in Sao Paulo and collided with a nearby building, according to data compiled by the Flight Safety Foundation, a nonprofit group aimed at improving air safety. In 2010, 158 people died when an Air India Express aircraft overshot a runway in Mangalore, India, and plummeted into a gorge before erupting into flames, according to the safety foundation.

The incident came as South Korea is embroiled into a huge political crisis triggered by President Yoon Suk Yeol’s stunning imposition of martial law and ensuing impeachment. Last Friday, South Korean lawmakers impeached acting President Han Duck-soo and suspended his duties, leading Deputy Prime Minister Choi Sang-mok to take over.

Choi ordered officials to employ all available resources to rescue the passengers and crew before he headed to Muan. Yoon’s office said his chief secretary, Chung Jin-suk, will preside over an emergency meeting between senior presidential staff later on Sunday to discuss the crash. __

Associated Press journalists Bobby Caina Calvan in New York and Chalida Ekvitthayavechnukul and Jintamas Saksornchai in Bangkok contributed to this report.