CORTIS Are Mobbed at Airport Again as James Nearly Falls...When Is Enough, Enough?

CORTIS have once again found themselves surrounded by fans at an airport. This time, however, the situation came dangerously close to ending in injury.

Following their appearance at the 2026 The Fact Music Awards in Busan on September 19, CORTIS headed to Busan’s Gimhae International Airport to travel to Japan for their next schedule. What should have been an ordinary departure that was not part of an official schedule instead became another chaotic scene as a large crowd gathered around the members and followed them through the airport.

Videos circulating online show fans pressing closely toward CORTIS despite security personnel attempting to maintain a path. The members had little room to move causing James to get caught directly in the congestion as footage shows him being pushed amid the crowd and colliding with a suitcase while attempting to move forward.

While no injury has been reported, with luggage, security personnel, fans and other passengers all moving through the same confined space, a slightly harder push or fall could have produced a very different outcome. However what is more concerning is that Gimhae was not an isolated incident.

CORTIS have repeatedly faced excessive crowds during airport arrivals and departures as their popularity has grown. The problem has become serious enough that BIGHIT MUSIC has issued multiple warnings concerning the group's airport movements and fan behavior.

The agency previously revealed that people had illegally obtained CORTIS's flight information, followed the members closely through airports and even boarded the same flights. It also reported cases of people following the members in vehicles and secretly filming them at close range during private time on overseas business trips.

The Gimhae incident therefore raises a question which is at what point does airport crowding stop being treated simply as over enthusiastic fandom behaviour and start being approached as a serious safety problem?

Airports are not fan events. There is no meet & greet, no photo time, no send-off and no performance. Artists are simply moving through the same check-in counters, security areas, gates and baggage facilities as ordinary passengers. Once a large crowd gathers the chance of an accident happening increases.

There is also a basic question for the fans who continue showing up to unofficial schedules: what exactly is the expected outcome? An airport encounter is not going to become a ten-minute conversation, a friendship or some uniquely meaningful interaction with an idol.

CORTIS are moving between already packed schedules, often across countries, and forcing yourself into those few private moments does not bring an artist closer to you. If anything, footage from incidents like Gimhae shows the opposite, with members appearing visibly uncomfortable and frustrated as they simply try to get through the crowd.

Furthermore, these are hardly the precious "fan moments" they are sometimes presented as. Airport photos and videos become content to circulate, monetize or sell, while private flight information itself has developed a market of its own. When getting content requires discovering an unofficial schedule, waiting for an artist, following them through a terminal and pushing close enough to interfere with their movement, the interaction becomes an invasion of privacy.

Proximity should not be confused with intimacy. Getting physically closer to an artist does not create a closer relationship with them, particularly when that proximity comes at the expense of their comfort and safety. CORTIS already provide concerts, fan events, performances and official content where fans are invited to interact with them. Their journey between those schedules does not need to become another event for fans to attend.

However, responsibility does not fall solely on the crowd as repeated incidents also raise questions about what agencies and security teams can realistically do to prevent similar scenes. K-POPIT contacted HYBE following the Gimhae incident to ask whether additional measures could be taken. The company explained that it is already taking the security measures currently available to protect CORTIS during airport movements.

There are, however, limits to what those measures can prevent. The Gimhae departure was a private schedule that had not been officially announced. This means that even though extensive-crowd control could be set in place, when a crowd forms around unannounced, there is only so much security personnel can do.

Agencies can take precautions, but those measures have limits if private information continues to circulate and fans continue treating unofficial airport movements as opportunities to see the members.

Supporting an artist does not require knowing which flight they are taking, waiting for them outside an undisclosed schedule, following their vehicle or getting close enough at an airport to touch them. In Busan, the incident ended without a reported injury, however, preventing the next one cannot depend entirely on how many security guards surround the members. As long as private flight information continues to circulate and fans continue turning unofficial movements into gatherings, the same risk will follow CORTIS from one airport to the next.