The death toll from a passenger plane that crashed in South Korea has risen to 179, meaning that all of the passengers and four of the plane’s six crew members are now confirmed to be dead.Two crew members were recovered alive from the site of the horrific crash and taken to hospital, meaning that the immediate fate of all 181 people on board the flight is now known.
The flight was a Jeju Air passenger plane, a Boeing 737-800 jet, which had departed from Bangkok, Thailand, and crashed following an emergency landing at an airport in the South Korean town of Muan.
All passengers and four crew members on board the plane are confirmed to have died (Chung Sung-Jun/Getty Images)
Footage of the crash appeared to show the plane skidding across the runway without having deployed its landing gear before it collided with a concrete wall and exploded.
Much of the plane was destroyed by the crash, with only the aircraft’s tail section recognisable from the debris.
According to the BBC, local news outlets have reported that one of the passengers sent a text message to a family member saying a bird was ‘stuck in the wing’ of the plane.
“Should I leave my last words,” was the final message they were able to send before the plane crashed, and with all passengers confirmed to be dead, that would have been the last message the person was able to send out.
The plane made an emergency landing at an airport in the South Korean town of Muan, but the landing gear failed to deploy (Twitter)
An investigation into the crash confirmed that the plane had been attempting to land before it was given a bird strike warning from air traffic control.
Around two minutes later, the plane issued a mayday warning and the flight was given permission to land at the airport, with the aircraft then coming into contact with the ground without the landing gear deployed before it skidded into the wall.
The plane’s black box has been recovered from the site of the crash so investigators will be able to learn what happened to the plane in the final moments.
South Korea’s government has declared a seven day period of mourning, and family members of the passengers on board the plane who had gathered at Muan International Airport will know the tragic news that their loved ones did not survive.
A passenger on board the plane sent a message to a family member saying a bird was ‘stuck in the wing’ before the crash. (BBC)
The runway will remain closed until New Year’s Day.
The two crew members who were taken from the plane still alive suffered ‘mid to severe’ injuries, while authorities said that the youngest passenger on board the plane was three-years-old, and the eldest being 78.
Five of the passengers on board the flight were children under the age of 10.
While a bird strike or weather conditions are being considered as causes of the crash, the exact cause has not yet been confirmed.
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A survivor from the devastating Azerbaijan Airlines crash has spoken of the moment he realised he was alive.
The Azerbaijan Airlines crash, which left 38 dead in Kazakhstan, went down on Christmas Day earlier this week. With 67 people on board, Flight 8243’s crash is currently a mystery as investigations are underway.
The plane, which was traveling to Grozny, Russia from Baku, was filmed as it touched down during an emergency landing and went up in flames as soon as it hit the ground.
Miraculously, 29 people survived – including Zulfugar Asadov, a flight attendant, and Subhonkul Rakhimov, a passenger.
An Azerbaijan Airlines plane crashed on Christmas Day, taking 38 lives (Meiramgul Kussainova/Anadolu via Getty Images)
From his hospital bed in Baku, Asadov spoke to the New York Times in a phone interview, saying: “Thank God I’m alive.”
Having been in such a deadly crash, it’s understandable that it could take a while to come around to the idea that you survived. Telling Reuters in another interview the moment he realised he had made it, passenger Rakhimov said: “I thought that was my last prayer.”
“After the bang… I thought the plane was going to fall apart,” he added.
Seated in the back of the aircraft, he said his body was hit by something, and that he was twisting before it all went silent. The only thing that he could hear were people moaning – which is when he ‘realized that we have landed’.
He said. “I didn’t know what to do — whether to laugh or cry.”
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29 people miraculously survived the deadly crash (Emergency Situations of Kazakhstan/Anadolu via Getty Images )
According to Kazakhstan’s Deputy Prime Minister Kanat Bozumbayev, 11 people were in critical condition after being pulled from the wreckage.
He said, as per CNN: “The bodies are in poor condition, mostly burnt, all collected. Now they will be in the morgue, and identification will take place.”
While only one survivor’s identity remains unknown, Bozumbayev revealed: “She is unconscious, has no documents, and is in the hospital.”
One woman joined the rescue and told Radio Free Europe’s Kazakh Service that the scene before her made her cry.
She said: “The front (part of the plane) was on fire. We rescued the survivors. Their bodies were covered in blood. They were crying. Everyone was asking for help.”
The woman, known as Elmira, said there were children and teenagers among the survivors.
An investigation is being launched into what caused the plane to go down (Emergency Situations of Kazakhstan/Anadolu via Getty Images)
“A little girl came out. She looked at me and said, ‘Save my mom, my mom is still there’. She was crying and begging, ‘Please save her, save her’,” she said.
Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Russian officials have gone on to launch an investigation into the crash.
Azerbaijan Airlines has suggested that the plane had suffered ‘physical and technical external interference,’ as per translation from the New York Times.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said a Russian Emergencies Ministry plane with medical personnel and equipment was flying to Kazakhstan to assist in the rescue at a summit for the Commonwealth of Independent States.
He said: “Let’s hope for a speedy recovery of the injured ones and, of course, I am sure, a thorough investigation will be carried out. We will coordinate the work of our special and aviation services on all issues related to this tragedy.”
