we start with the developing news from South Korea a plane has crashed on landing at an airport in the country and at least 176 people have been killed the Boeing 7 c37 belonging to juu Airlines had 181 people on board and officials say they expect that most are dead they say some passengers fell out of the fuselage during the crash at moan International Airport two survivors have been found and this is the moment that the plane skidded down the runway before hitting a wall and bursting into flames the aircraft had flown from Bangkok and was
arriving at muan airport theth authorities say a bird strike may have caused the landing gear to malfunction the airline has issued a formal apology let's speak to yuku from the BBC Korean Service hello to you just tell us oh you're inside the airport now thank you so much for joining us from there tell us about the people who you've been seeing and speaking to the have gathered there just waiting for news aren't they yes that's true Lucy um there have been uh 170 confirmed deaths so far uh and people here yet many of them are
still unidentified so many people uh mostly the families of the B are waiting here uh waiting for the announcement or the identification so right now I'm standing inside the airport where also many other amilies of The Bu are saying and from far even far away I can hear uh some of the families screaming and uh crying as they hear the announcement of the death of their loved ones and most of the people on board the plane were they from South Korea I understand they may have all been on holiday in Thailand for Christmas uh that
is true it it is known that most of the people who are uh in the plane were families uh even there was youngest was born in 2021 and there were many family members all together and also most of them are South Korean Nationals although there were two Thai National as well and in terms of um the PE two people who survived we understand that they were crew members uh has anything else been said about them uh unfortunately after um the announcement of two survivors we are not hearing any additional survivors at this moment and it
seems pretty much uh low chance to expect another Survivor and they are right now uh staying in the hospital uh luckily not very heavily damaged however um they are not they aren't doing interviews but it is known that according to local reports they were saying to the hospital and one of them said um they barely remember anything uh before the accident I mean it is extraordinary we look at the footage of the huge plume of smoke from when the the plane crashed into that wall at the end of the runway it is extraordinary to think
that anybody could have been pulled out of there uh alive um can you talk to us about what the authorities have been saying about this Mayday call made by the the pilot and also the fact that there was this air um this Air Traffic Control warning about a potential bird strike what can you tell us about what was said by the author on that front so far the investigation has just started so there aren much to confirm but however the authority have been saying that they uh issued a bir C uh warning just before the
accident and then one minute later uh the plane Center made a signal uh saying that they're in an urgent situation and then the plane uh just landed without a landing GE uh and unfortunately they couldn't speed down and eventually Crush to the end of the wrong way that's what we know at so far and can you tell us a bit more about this Airline it's very well known isn't it it's a budget airline in South Korea that that a lot of people will have used true uh this is one of the most popular lowbudget airline
in South Korea um however it is known that um this from Bangkok to TNA this Airway has just uh they just uh began operating this line so uh people are saying that there must have been inexperienced um a steps regarding this flight however um the authorities are keep saying that they need to uh investigate uh thoroughly to exactly know what is the actual cause behind this accident many people are expecting uh there have been like one or two bird strikes which eventually caused the flame inside of flame in inside of plane however uh it is
just a guess for right now and there's a huge number of emergency Personnel were sent to the scene weren't there more than 1,500 people were sent there to to deal with this can you just explain who is in charge who's coordinating everything because we've got an acting president who's only been in the job two days uh is it the president's office and the president who's coordinating all of this who's in charge so as you said I think president is right now in charge of everything however as we know um they're having some political turmoils in
South Korea in in this month and um the Prime Minister have just been impeached on Friday so many people are worrying uh if they if this uh accident can be settled quite soon uh so uh however as you said there are more than 1,000 personnels uh Securities and those in support of the family of the fures so we are expecting see to settle down soon and who is it that's dealing with the with the relatives those people there where you are in the airport are they getting regular updates who's looking after them so right now
fire authorities uh who are in charge of rescuing efforts are uh making announcement regularly about like 1 hour and two hours every every hour so um the family of the are now gathering in certain part of the airport to where fire authorities come out and say uh the updates and what they have found so far presumably there's no other activity in the airport there presumably that's been completely closed to everybody else and it's just reporters like yourself along with the the relatives of those people who are are looking for answers right now um journalists are
quite uh restricted to move around this airport and the airport itself the Runway is closed until 1 of January so apparently you can say the airport isn't operating because of this accident right and you may not be able to see from where you are but we're looking at the the images of the crash site which it's dark outside now of course they seem to have turned the the flood lights off but presumably although there actually a different view there was showing a few flood lights a bit further away but presumably the police forensics are still
on site are they yes true and the police and the relevant authorities have been saying it is really difficult to investigate into the reason behind The Clash because um as you mentioned earlier um the plane was shattered into pieces and there is hardly any wreckage left there only the little bit of the tail part of the plane so this is making the investigation and rescue and identification effort very extreme challenging right now I think what we're looking at is the taale of the plane and it's my understanding that the flight crew the two members of
the flight crew who were pulled from the debris alive were in that back section but but we also saw the forensics experts in their white suits going through the the sort of grassy area around the um the runway and quite a large site that they were covering isn't it yes because now right now many people are so desperate to know the reason behind this Clash because um as I said many people are guessing there was a bird strike behind this accident however bird strike is um not a something that you that happens very often but
that is something that the any airplane company should be aware of and to be and they should have been like uh ready to confront this kind of uh accident so people are saying um what people are insisting is to um look into the reason behind this accident um unless um because uh many people are using using this low budget Airlines these days and they are now afraid to use this Airlines uh because of potential H strike or accident devastating accident like this so I think the authorities trying to speed up the investigation process at this
moment in terms of the Airline safety record though I mean South Korea has a good safety record doesn't it when it comes to Airline safety and this would be the worst aviation accident in South Korea history isn't couldn't it in terms of the numbers I mean we know 181 people were on board and the authorities saying that they think most of the people are dead they've confirmed 176 but they say that they believe most people have died it's just a a matter of confirming them in terms of the safety record though South Korea has a
good one that is true um people are saying this is uh definitely the worst plane accident happened after 2000 before 2000 there was one of the big uh plane accident in 1997 however um if we exclude that one um this is um I think this will be one of the this will be the biggest uh plane accident with the biggest casualty yeah I've been seeing that the plane manufacturer Boeing has offered its condolences and says it's in touch with South Korea's juu air after uh this crash the crash involved a Boeing made 737800 um what
is the the CEO was talking earlier wasn't they of juu a what did the CEO have to say actually the CEO was uh um showing his condolences to the family of the ber and those who are related uh to the passengers uh however there was small um small dispute among like uh the journalist and the CEO because right after the briefing CEO tried to uh leave the location as soon as possible without answering the questions by the journalist so um right now people are saying that J Airline and the relevant people should be uh take
more responsibility and show some actions regarding this accident yeah okay well thank you so much um for talking to us from inside the airport I really appreciate your time and hopefully we'll talk to you a bit later that's Yu there uh talking to us from inside muan International Airport there we can just show you the footage of the plane uh as it came down uh it landed on the air on on the runway at the airport and as you can see going at quite some speed uh without its landing gear down and this is the
moment um that it touched down onto the the runway and then you can see there that's the moment afterwards where it burst into flames after hitting a wall um the death toll uh has now increased to 177 people so that is the official uh number of dead confirmed there were 181 people on board and uh the officials believe that most people on the plane have have died um but it's a question of confirming that uh we do know though that two people managed to survive two members of the crew who were based at the back
at the tail near the Tail of the plane uh were pulled out and taken to hospital uh a little earlier we haven't had an update on their condition uh as yet though we can hear now from the local fire chief who gave an update on the rescue operation at the airport we are presuming the cause of the accident to be a bird strike or deteriorating weather conditions and the exact cause will be determined by a further forensic and Joint investigation we are doing our best to search for more survivors as a person who has seen
the site I can only say that I am sad well I mentioned just a moment ago that the CEO of JD a has given a statement we can hear it now he's apologized for the incident and bowed deeply during a televised briefing he said that the cause of the crash was still unknown and that the aircraft had no record of accidents and that there were no early signs of malfunction he also insisted that the airline will cooperate with investigators and make supporting the bereaved its priority firstly I bow in apology to everyone who cherished jedu
he above all I want to give my sincere apology and condolences to those whove lost their lives in the accident and their families at moment it's hard to presume the cause of the accident and we have to wait for the official investigation result from the authorities well the families of the victims of the crash are gathered at muan International Airport and they listened as the names of those who died were read out and a warning that some of you may find this distressing [Music] [Music] those are the scenes there at the airport is names of
those who died in the crash were read out to the families waiting uh we can hear now from Jen Moon who's a journalist in South Korea she gave an update from the airport so it's been now seven to eight hours um since the crash and authorities are still uh s making their way uh to the to rescue and search um either survive survivors or those um the bodies um heartbreaking scenes continue to unfold here at muan International Airport as more than 100 family members gathered in a meeting room to receive updates about their loved ones
uh they are being briefed every half an hour by government authorities on on the whereabouts and the uh whatabouts of the investigations and the search and rescue operations but I continue to hear whales of grief by family members um some are expressing anger at what they see as delayed responses from authorities and the airline uh some of these families have been pleading to be allowed near the crash site since this morning but were denied access due to the uh restricted nature of the airport Zone uh the arrival area of the airport is now packed with
families uh and Red Cross volunteers uh they're handing out blankets many people are hugging each other weeping um and there's a lot of just confusion amongst people scrambling to identify their loved ones and F and fill the airport area where hundreds of relatives are gathered waiting for the news no cause for the uh plane crash has been officially confirmed yet but what the relatives and the loved ones are hearing is that um the fire service has actually suggested it could have been because of a collision with birds in poor weather conditions the transport Ministry officials
have said that their early assessment of communication record showed the airport control tower issued a bird strike warning to the plane shortly before it intend to land and and gave its pilot permission to land in a different area the pilot then sent out a distress signal shortly before the plane went past the runway and skitted acoss the buffer zone here at the airport so they told they informed the plane that there was a risk that they might hit some birds on landing and gave them the option do you say to to to land somewhere else
yes they they were given that and uh but still uh we what we saw was actually a plane landing uh on a belly landing actually without its landing gear operating and um and then the the plane hitting a wall and bursting into planes in fact the plane was almost completely destroyed by this explosion with um from what I saw on site just a few hours ago with this just tail part retaining a little bit of shape and the rest of the plane um looks almost impossible to recognize I'm still smelling a lot of um a
lot of um aviation fuel here at the airport uh and so this was a large explosion that um that the authorities are still trying to investigate the actual cause it is extraordinary as we look at the footage of that crash to think that anybody could have survived but they did pull two people out of the plane didn't they they did those were the two crew members those in their 20s uh one male one female crew members of chichu air they were actually pulled from the tail end of the aircraft so those two survivors came from
the tillan which is now the remainder the only remaining of debris from that aircraft crash the two crew have been uh sent uh to Soul which is about 288 km from here to um to hospitals of their preference in Soul and you said um a little earlier that the families some of them were complaining about the delayed response from the authorities in in what way in what what did that refer to do you know um so there were a lot of confusion on when and where the briefings uh from different government Ministries would be held
for instance the The Briefing that's being held by juu a itself from the CEO and its uh its top finance officer it are being held in Soul which is um like I said 290 kilm away from here so um the B families are complaining about that also there was also confusion about the uh the list of uh those identified de and so those names did not match the actual identity so there's just a lot of confusion here right now with authorities uh scrambling to get things straight and uh to basically uh offer support for the
bed families that is Jen Moon a journalist at muan International Airport I just show you the images again of the moment that this uh airplane came down without its landing gear onto the runway there at muan International Airport uh it then crashed into a wall and as you can see it burst into flames with the Flames destroying most of the aircraft we understand that most of the passengers on board had been in Thailand for a holiday over Christmas there were two Thai Nationals on board but most of them uh the rest of the passengers were
believed to be South Korean um and we know know also that two members of the pl's crew did manage to survive and were pulled from the wreckage and taken to hospital the official number of people who are known to have died is now 177 although we do expect that death toll to rise because the authorities have said there were 181 people on board and that they believe that most of them have died in that crash at muan International Airport
