179 dead, 2 rescued after plane crashes while landing in South Korea All 181 passengers and crew on board a passenger jet that crashed in South Korea on Sunday morning were feared to have perished except the two survivors who were taken out from the debris by authorities.
The first is a male crew of one of the flights, hospitalized and being treated in an ICU for nonlife-threatening injury. The second is another female crew member who had just been taken to the wards and is recovering with some not-life-threatening injury," Health Ministry officials.
Jeju Air Flight 2216 was landing on the runway at Muan International Airport around 9 am local time when the airplane went off the runway into a wall.
The Boeing 737 airliner departed Bangkok with 175 passengers and six crew members. The Korean Ministry of Land Infrastructure and Transport and National Fire Agency compiled an official death toll from the crash, releasing that number as under-reported at first but then spiking steadily in the hours post-crash.
From the sources, they are trying to rush through the identification of the victims. Even though 141 out of 179 people have been identified by their fingerprint identification and DNA control, 38 still remain unidentified.
The body is sometimes so damaged that one would fail to detect a print. Thirdly, fingerprints are not present in children, and hence, there is a need for comparing family DNA.
Details of what happened began to come into focus, as the transport ministry said it was on the scene investigating the cause of the crash. According to the ministry, the control tower had issued a warning before the plane crashed-landed over a possible bird strike. The ministry says a minute after that warning, a pilot sent a Mayday distress signal, after which the tower issued permission for the aircraft to land.
The Air and Railway Investigation Committee said that the "black boxes" of the plane were recovered from the wreckage. The flight data recorder of the plane was found partially damaged, but its cockpit voice recorder was collected intact, officials said.
Videos taken at the scene of the crash appear to show that the plane's landing gear came down high, which could be an indicator of some type of malfunction with that system and further suggests the plane seemed to land at a high rate of speed. Flames and a column of dark smoke were seen at the site from videos shot at the scene.
As such, authorities say that at 1 PM local time, it completely burnt. The airport morgue is going to be a temporary one.
The official death toll had climbed to 176 by about 8 p.m., the National Fire Agency said. Eighty-three of the dead were women and 82 were men, the agency said, adding that another 11 bodies remained unidentified. The flight manifest showed there were five children under 10 years old on the flight, with the youngest of them aged 3.
Early reports were mixed about the number of those rescued.
US President Joe Biden has stated that he and the first lady, Jill Biden, were "deeply saddened to learn of the loss of life" in this crash.
"As close allies, the American people share deep bonds of friendship with the South Korean people and our thoughts and prayers are with those affected by this tragedy. The United States stands ready to provide any needed assistance," the statement added.
Distraught families wait in the airport's arrival hall in tears for the identification of bodies.
Some of those killed have been identified only by their fingerprints.
Maeng Gi-su, 78, told the BBC that his nephew and his nephew's two sons had been on the plane.
"I can't believe the whole family has just disappeared," he said. "My heart aches so much."
The passengers comprised 173 South Koreans and two Thai nationals, Yonhap news agency in South Korea reported adding that they ranged in age from three to 78 years, although most were 40s, 50s, and 60-year-olds.
Jongluk Doungmanee, 49, was going back home to South Korea to visit families. The mother-of-two in South Korea, with the husband, farms.
Her cousin Pornphichaya Chalermsin, interviewed by BBC Thai, said that she has only ever seen such news of other countries and never even thought it would involve Thai people, adding: "Watch the video footage makes me feel even more distressed."
Footage of the crash - which occurred around 09:00 local time, or 00:00 GMT - showed the aircraft land without wheels, overshoot the runway, and crash into the perimeter wall of the airport before it exploded into flames.
South Korean transport officials said the plane experienced problems while attempting to land - with the pilot, who had more than 6,800 hours of flight experience, pulling out of the first attempt due to bird interference.
Just after that, the pilot made a mayday call and was allowed to land in the opposite direction from normal.
Aviation officials have blamed a bird strike and bad weather, but experts are questioning whether those factors would have been sufficient to cause such a fatal crash.
Two survivors, who are crew members were rescued from the debris of the Boeing 737-800.
Footages of the plane landing without its wheels along the runway, skidding up to a wall before colliding with it in a fiery explosion.
The flight departed from Bangkok, Thailand, and had 181 people.
The BBC interviewed a man who says he lost his three family members and even the cousin of one of two Thai nationals on board.
South Korea declared a national mourning period for the next seven days.
An investigation is ongoing. Here is what we know so far about what might have led to the crash.
We're closing our live blog. For more on this story, click here. And here are the moments before the crash:.
Scores of people died on Sunday when a passenger jet crash-landed at an airport in southwestern South Korea, careening down the runway on its belly before bursting into flames.
Only two of the 181 people on board survived, as the local fire department confirmed the deaths of 179 people. Two crew members were pulled alive from the crash site.
It is the deadliest aviation disaster to hit South Korea since 1997, when a Korean Airlines Boeing 747 crashed in the Guam jungle, with the loss of 228 lives.
Jeju Air flight 7C 2216 from Bangkok was carrying 175 passengers and six crew when disaster struck at the airport in Muan county, on the country's southwestern tip, just after 9 a.m. local time Sunday (7 p.m. ET Saturday
Footage of the crash on Sunday broadcast by several South Korean news networks showed the plane sliding at high speed on its belly, crashing into an earthen embankment and erupting in a fireball.
Neither the back nor front landing gear was visible in the footage – broadcast by networks including YTN, JTBC, and MBC – as smoke poured from the back of the sliding aircraft.
Later, firemen were seen using water-powered cannons to quench the burning remains of the plane. According to tracking website FlightAware, the plane was a Boeing 737-800. Parts of the aircraft were littered all over the runways.
The South Jeolla Fire Service says that the dead include 84 men, 85 women, and 10 whose genders could not be identified. Both of the survivors were crew members, one male and one female, the rescue team said.
Two Thai nationals were among those on board, the South Korean Land Ministry said. All the other passengers were South Koreans.
Experts said the plane's undercarriage, which houses the wheels that touch the ground during takeoff and landing, did not seem to have extended before the plane touched down. It is not known what may have prevented it from doing so.
Aviation analysts say that more evidence is required before South Korean authorities can conclusively pinpoint what may have caused Sunday's crash, including speculations by local officials about a possible bird strike before the crash landing.
Remarks followed a media briefing by Lee Jeong-hyun, Muan Fire Department chief, who stated the cause "is estimated to be a bird strike or bad weather." The footage of the crash, however, depicted clear skies at the time.
"This is the worst enemy of an investigator: speculation," said David Soucie, former Federal Aviation Administration safety inspector.
" In fact, that's why it's so protected when there is an aircraft accident investigation, the information is protected. They're not supposed to be making any speculation about this type of thing," Soucie told CNN's Paula Newton.
Aviation industry consultant Scott Hamilton echoed Soucie's concerns and urged South Korean authorities to "stop making declarative statements" at this stage.
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