Doomed Japan plane on third quake mission when runway disaster hit

TOKYO, Jan 4 (Reuters) – A Coast Guard plane was making its third emergency trip to an earthquake zone within 24 hours when it collided with a passenger jet at a very busy Haneda airport, a Coast Guard official told Reuters. The official declined to be named due to an ongoing investigation into the runway crash between the De Havilland Dash-8 turboprop and a Japan Airlines Airbus A350 passenger jet. Five of the six Coast Guard crew died but all 379 people on the JAL plane escaped. Details of the Coast Guard plane’s movements before the collision have not previously been reported. The surviving pilot from the Coast Guard crew is under scrutiny after authorities released control tower transcripts appearing…