179 killed, 2 survive in South Korea's worst plane crash; flyer’s last text: ‘Bird stuck in wing’

MUAN (SOUTH KOREA): A Jeju Air plane carrying 181 people from Thailand to South Korea crashed on arrival Sunday, smashing into a barrier and bursting into flames, killing everyone aboard except for two flight attendants plucked from the wreckage.

A bird strike was cited by authorities as the likely cause of the crash - the worst aviation disaster on South Korean soil - which flung passengers out of the plane and left it "almost completely destroyed", according to fire officials. Video showed the Boeing 737-800 landing on its belly at Muan International Airport, skidding off the runway as smoke streamed out from the engines, before crashing into a wall and exploding in flames.

"Of the 179 dead, 65 have been identified," the country's fire agency said, adding that DNA retrieval had begun. Inside the airport terminal, tearful family members gathered to wait for news.

An official began calling out the names of the 65 victims who had been identified, with each name triggering fresh cries of grief from waiting relatives.

Only two people - both flight attendants - were rescued from the crash.

"Passengers were ejected from the aircraft after it collided with the wall, leaving little chance of survival," a local fire official told families at a briefing.

A Flyer's Last Text: 'Bird Stuck In Wing'Uncertainties surround the deadliest crash on South Korean soil, experts said on Sunday, questioning how much impact a potential bird strike cited by authorities could've had in bringing down the Jeju Air flight.

The apparent absence of landing gear, the timing of the twin-engine Boeing 737-800's belly landing at Muan International Airport and reports of a possible bird strike all raised questions that could not yet be answered. The single-aisle aircraft was seen skidding down the runway with no landing gear deployed before hitting a wall in an explosion of flame and debris. "At this point there are a lot more questions than we've answers. Why was the plane going so fast? Why were the flaps not open? Why was the landing gear not down?" said Gregory Alegi, an aviation expert.

South Korean officials are investigating the crash, including the impact of a potential bird strike and the weather, in which 179 of 181 people on board died. In the space of a few minutes, the control tower issued a bird strike warning, pilots declared mayday and then attempted to land, officials said, although it wasn't clear if the aircraft had hit any birds. A passenger texted a relative to say a bird was stuck in the wing The person's final message was, "Should I say my last words?"

Deputy transport minister Joo Jong-wan said the runway's 2,800m length was not a contributing factor, and that walls at the ends were built to industry standards. "Both black boxes - flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder - have been found," he said. Low-cost carrier Jeju Air said it "sincerely" apologised - with top officials shown bowing deeply at a presser in Seoul - and vowed to do all it could to help.

Christian Beckert, a flight safety expert, said video footage suggests that aside from the reversers, most of the braking systems were not activated, creating a "big problem" and a fast landing. He said a bird strike was unlikely to have damaged the landing gear while it was still up, and that if it had happened when it was down, it would have been hard to raise again.

As speculation swirled about the cause, family members of passengers endured the painful wait for news of their loved ones. Wails and screams filled the airport. A young woman comforted an older woman weeping about her son. Two crying women embraced each other. Only 65 of the dead could be identified through fingerprints and other means. A dozen bodies were so badly damaged that officials could not identify their gender. All of the passengers were Korean apart from two Thais, with the youngest a three-year-old boy and the oldest a 78-year-old. The two survivors were transferred to separate hospitals. "When I woke up, I had already been rescued," a 33-year-old flight attendant told doctors. He suffered multiple fractures, while the other crew member - a 25-year-old woman - injured her ankle and head.

The crash was especially shocking for the country because it has had no major aviation disaster after a spate of deadly air accidents in 1990s and earlier. In the last major aviation accident involving a South Korean airline, a Korean Air jet slammed into a hill in Guam, a US territory in the Pacific, in 1997, killing 229 of the 254 people on board. The crash was likely the deadliest globally since that of Lion Air Flight 610 in 2018, when all 189 flyers died as the plane plunged into Java Sea.