All passengers and four crew members confirmed dead after South Korea plane crash

We’re closing this blog now. Here is a recap of what’s happened:

• A Jeju Air passenger plane smashed into a wall at the end of a runway at Muan International Airport in South Korea on Sunday after touching down without landing gear
• All 179 passengers and four of the six crew members onboard died
• The two survivors, both cabin crew members, are aged in their 20s and are understood to have been at the rear of the plane during the crash.
• The plane was a 15-year-old Boeing 737-800 jet that was carrying passengers from Bangkok, who were mainly holidaymakers
• The airport’s control tower issued a bird strike warning as the plane attempted to land
• Shortly after the bird strike warning, the pilots declared mayday and then attempted to land on the opposite side of the runway, officials said
• The passengers were predominantly South Korean and included two Thai nationals
• One of the black boxes recovered from the plane sustained damage in the crash, which could delay analysis of the data by a month, investigators said
• South Korea’s acting president, Choi Sang-mok, declared a seven-day national mourning period over the plane crash

US President Joe Biden said the country is ”prepared to provide any necessary assistance to South Korea” following the crash.

In a statement he said: “As close allies, the American people share deep bonds of friendship with the South Korean people and our thoughts and prayers are with those impacted by this tragedy.

“The United States stands ready to provide any necessary assistance.”

America’s National Transportation Safety Board has announced it is leading a team of investigators to help South Korea’s aviation authority in its investigation of the crash.

Boeing, which made the aircraft, and the Federal Aviation Administration, a civil aviation regulator in the US, are participating in the probe, it added.

The King has paid condolences to the loved ones of the 179 people killed in the South Korea plane crash.

The King said he and the Queen will be holding the families and loved ones of those who died in their prayers and they are ”profoundly saddened” to ”learn of the horrific air accident at Muan, which resulted in such grievous loss of life”.

He added: “As the people of the Republic of Korea mourn this disaster, the families and loved ones of all the victims are in our prayers.”

Jeon Je-young, the father of a woman killed in the crash, said he was shocked about what happened.

Je-young said he cannot believe his daughter Mi-sook, who he described as “warm hearted” died in a plane crash.

He said: “When I saw the accident video, the plane seemed out of control. The pilots probably had no choice but to do it. My daughter ended up like this. This is unbelievable.”

He said Mi-sook was in her 40s and his last brief moment with her was when she brought some food and next year’s calendar to his house on 21 December.

Je-young added he keeps watching footage of the plane slamming into a wall and bursting into flames.

Investigators are probing whether a bird strike may have caused the crash.

While the exact cause of the tragedy remains unclear, investigators are examining whether birds collided with the aircraft.

Korean news agency Yonhap said airport authorities have suggested a bird strike may have led to a malfunction in the aircraft’s landing gear.

A transport ministry official later confirmed the control tower issued a bird strike warning minutes before the accident, with the pilots declaring a mayday call shortly after the initial warning.

According to Reuters, a passenger texted a relative to say a bird was stuck in the wing.

Footage on social media also appeared to show what is believed to be a bird colliding with one of the engines – but the footage has not been verified yet by South Korean officials.

Aviation expert Sally Gethin told Sky News it is a “plausible explanation” because it could damage the engine and cause the hydraulics to fail.

“The pilots would have had to make very split-second decisions on what their options would be in a case like that.

“They would have decided they didn’t have enough time to divert to another aerodrome and so they took the decision to land at that particular one.

“Then, of course, they ran out of runway and hit a buffer wall right at the end which caused the actual eruption.”

Read more from Caolan Magee here.

A team of US aviation accident investigators, including representatives from Boeing, will assist South Korean authorities in their investigation into the cause of the country’s deadliest plane crash.

The US’s National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) is leading a team of investigators to help South Korea’s aviation authority in its investigation of the Jeju Air crash in Muan, it said on Sunday.

Boeing and the US’s federal aviation administration are participating, NTSB said.

By Simon Marks

As the investigation begins into the deadly crash in South Korea of Jeju Air flight 7C2216, news of the disaster comes at the end of a catastrophic year for the plane’s manufacturer, Boeing.

It is too early to know whether the doomed 737-800 suffered from any kind of technical failure, and the black box flight recorders – recovered at the scene – will offer vital clues.

A Boeing spokesperson said the company was in “contact with Jeju Air regarding flight 2216 and stands ready to support them. We extend our deepest condolences to the families who lost loved ones, and our thoughts remain with the passengers and crew”.

South Korean air traffic controllers warned the jet’s pilots about the risk of bird strikes as the plane descended towards Muan International Airport. But images of the plane bursting into flame, having lost control on the runway without a fully deployed landing gear, have raised questions among aviation analysts about the possibility of a cascading series of difficulties engulfing the pilots in the cockpit.

The 737-800 has one of aviation’s best safety records, despite being the predecessor to the disaster-plagued 737 MAX planes that have bedevilled Boeing throughout 2024.

In April, a 737-800 operated by Southwest Airlines lost an engine cover during take-off from Denver. The cowling struck a wing flap, forcing the plane to return safely to the airport. The investigation into that incident has focused on maintenance by the airline, rather than any kind of inherent manufacturing flaw.

But for Boeing, much will now hinge on the outcome of the South Korean investigation. The company’s “annus horribilis” saw CEO Dave Calhoun effectively forced to resign, amid mounting Congressional and customer fury over Boeing’s handling of the 737 MAX crisis. The jets, designed to compete with Airbus’s more fuel-efficient A320neo, were grounded by the Federal Aviation Administration for 18 months following two fatal crashes that claimed a total of 346 lives.

Read the full article here.

Jeju Air CEO Kim E-Bae has apologised to relatives of passengers at the Muan International Airport.

Kim said the exact cause of the crash is yet to be determined and “we must await the official investigation results from the relevant government agencies” but that he takes full responsibility as CEO.

Philip Goldberg, the US ambassador to South Korea, has expressed his “sincerest condolences” to those affected by Sunday’s plane crash at Muan International Airport.

Goldberg wrote on X: “I was heartbroken to hear about the tragedy at Muan Airport this morning. My sincerest condolences go out to the victims and their loved ones, and my thoughts are with the people of Korea during this difficult time.”

The captain of the crashed plane had worked at that rank since 2019 and had logged 6,823 flight hours, South Korea’s transport ministry said.

The first officer had worked at that rank since 2023 and had logged approximately 1,650 flight hours.

After the control tower issued the bird strike warning and the pilots declared mayday, they attempted to land on the runway from the opposite direction, a transport ministry official said.

“In the process of landing it hit a navigation safety facility called a localiser and collided with the wall,” the official said.

• A Jeju Air plane skidded off a runway at Muan International Airport in South Korea on Sunday, slammed into a concrete fence and burst into flames after its front landing gear apparently failed to deploy.
• All but two of the 181 people – 175 passengers and six crew members – onboard died.
• A three-year-old boy has been revealed as the youngest victim.
• The South Korean fire agency said 85 women, 84 men and 10 others whose genders weren’t immediately identifiable were killed in the fire that engulfed the plane.
• The two survivors, both members of the crew, are aged in their 20s and are understood to have been at the back of the plane during the crash.
• The passenger plane was a 15-year-old Boeing 737-800 jet that had arrived from Bangkok and the crash happened at 9:03am, according to the ministry of transport.
• The air traffic control tower issued a bird strike warning, then minutes later the pilots declared mayday and attempted to land, officials said.
• The passengers were predominantly South Korean and included two Thai nationals.
• One of the survivors, a man, was being treated in an intensive care unit for fractures to his ribs, shoulder blade and upper spine, Ju Woong, director of the Ewha Womans University Seoul Hospital, said.
• One of the black boxes recovered from the plane sustained damage in the crash, which could delay analysis of the data by a month.

Chinese President Xi Jinping is among the world leaders who have expressed their condolences in response to a plane crash that killed all passengers and four out of six crew members in South Korea.

In a Telegram message to South Korea’s acting president Choi Sang-mok, Xi wished the injured a swift recovery.

“On behalf of the Chinese government and people, I express my deep condolences to the victims and my sincerest consolations to the victims’ families, and wish for the swift recovery of the injured,” he was quoted as saying by China’s state-run CCTV.

One of the two survivors of the Jeju Air plane crash told doctors he had already been rescued when he awoke, news agency Yonhap reported, which quoted hospital director Ju Woong.

The 33-year-old flight attendant was initially taken to a hospital in Mokpo, some 25km (15.5 miles) south of the airport, and was later transferred to Ewha Womans University Seoul Hospital in Seoul.

“He’s fully able to communicate,” Ju said.

The survivor suffered multiple fractures and is continuing to receive special care due to the risk of after-effects, which could include total paralysis, Yonhap reported.

One of the black boxes recovered from the Jeju Air plane sustained damage in the crash, potentially delaying the analysis to determine the cause of the accident by “about a month”.

The flight data recorder from the Boeing 737-800 aircraft had been damaged by the time it was collected, an official from the Aviation and Railway Accident Investigation Board said.

“Decoding the FDR alone could take about a month,” the unnamed official told the Yonhap news agency.

The official added that the plane’s cockpit voice recorder – another black box – had remained intact in the crash.

The cousin of a Thai passenger killed on the aircraft said she is “saddened” and “shocked” by the fatal crash.

Pornphichaya Chalermsin, from Nong Wua So District, Udon Thani, told the BBC that her cousin Jongluk Doungmanee, 49, was living in South Korea with her two children, aged 7 and 15, and Korean husband.

Speaking to BBC Thai, she said she had “only ever seen such news from other countries and never thought it would involve Thai people”.

“Watching the video footage made me feel even more distressed,” the cousin added.

“I was shocked, I had goosebumps. I couldn’t believe it… when the news said one of the victims was from Udon Thani, I was even more surprised.”

Jongluk had been in Thailand visiting family with her husband. Her husband returned to South Korea before she departed.

The crash was not due to “any maintenance issues,” the head of Jeju Air’s management team has said.

Song Kyung-hoon told a press briefing on Sunday night: “There are areas we have to investigate further by determining the exact cause of the crash.”

The Yonhap news agency reported that Kyung-hoon reiterated that maintenance checks are carried out as scheduled and that staff leave “no stone unturned” ahead of take-offs.

Kyung-hoon also said the airliner’s insurance plan will be able to support the victims and their families, Yonhap reported.

Pope Francis has said his “thoughts turn to the many families in South Korea who are mourning today following the dramatic air accident,” as world leaders continued to issue condolences.

Speaking in Rome’s St Peter’s Square, Francis said he joins in “prayer for the survivors and the dead.”

Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba said he was “deeply saddened by the loss of many precious lives” in a message released through Tokyo’s Foreign Ministry.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on X that “each life lost is an immeasurable tragedy” and that he extends his “heartfelt condolences” on behalf of the Ukrainian people and himself.

The length of the runway at Muan International Airport was not a contributing factor in the deadly aviation disaster that resulted in the deaths of at least 179 people after a plane veered off the runway, collided into a concrete wall and erupted into a fireball, according to a minister.

Joo Jong-wan, deputy transport minister, said the runway’s 2,800-metre length was not a contributing factor, and that the walls at the ends had been built according to safety standards.

“Both ends of the runway have safety zones with green buffer areas before reaching the outer wall,” he told a briefing.

“The airport is designed according to standard aviation safety guidelines, even if the wall may appear closer than it actually is.”