BREAKING: Bird strike suspected in South Korea plane crash – at least 177 dead

A passenger jet carrying 181 people has crashed in South Korea, killing at least 177 people.

Two crew members have been rescued but the remaining two missing people are presumed dead, according to firefighters.

The youngest victim was a three-year-old boy, according to a list of passengers seen by local media outlets, and five of those killed were under 10.

The incident is the deadliest disaster in South Korea’s aviation history.

The Boeing 737-800 jet – Jeju Air flight 7C2216 from Bangkok – was carrying 175 passengers and six crew members.

It was making a second attempt at a crash landing after its landing gear failed to open, local media reports.

Witnesses on the ground reported hearing a “loud explosion” and seeing sparks in the plane’s engine before it crashed.

The plane veered off a runway at Muan International Airport and crashed into a wall, bursting into flames.

Officials say birds may have struck an engine before the crash, reports Yonhap News Agency.

The airport’s control tower warned the plane about the bird strike and gave the pilot permission to land in a different area to normal, according to South Korea’s transport ministry.

A passenger texted a relative to say a bird was stuck in the wing of the plane, News1 reports.

Their final message was said to have been: “Should I say my last words?”

The pilot sent out a distress signal shortly before the crash, officials said.

Workers have now retrieved the flight data recorder from the plane’s black box and are still looking for the cockpit voice recording device, said senior transport ministry official Joo Jong-wan.

The two crew members who were rescued are in hospital and talking. “Smoke came out of one of the engines and then it exploded,” Ms Ku, a female flight attendant in her 20s, told Yonhap news agency.

Another survivor, flight attendant Mr Lee, 33, reportedly asked a doctor who was checking him over in hospital: “Why did I end up here?”

He added: “I was wearing my seatbelt before landing, and it seemed like the plane had landed, but I don’t remember anything after that.”

He suffered a fractured left shoulder and head injuries, according to the Aju Business Daily newspaper.

Passenger concerns

Just two days ago, a passenger claiming to have travelled on the same plane said it had an engine shut down as people were boarding, according to Sky’s correspondent in the region, referencing Yonhap News Agency.

A passenger who boarded the Jeju Air Flight 7C2216 said: “I was on the same plane at the time and the engine shut off several times.”

He said he’d set off from Muan International Airport for Bangkok and became worried: “I told the flight attendants and they said there was no problem.”

Other passengers, he claimed, also had concerns and the plane was delayed for an hour “due to airport issues”.

Weather conditions were also being looked at as a possible cause of the crash.

Most of the passengers aboard the Jeju Air plane were holidaymakers returning from a five-day Christmas package tour to Bangkok, according to South Korean news agency Newsis.

Further photos shared by local media showed smoke and flames engulfing much of the plane, while witnesses described a smell of aviation fuel and blood at the crash site.

Search for bodies

Thirty-two fire trucks and several helicopters were deployed to contain the blaze, with about 1,560 firefighters, police officers, soldiers and other officials sent to the site, according to the fire agency.

Lee Jeong-hyeon, chief of the Muan fire station, said rescue teams were searching for bodies scattered by the impact of the crash.

The plane was completely destroyed with only the tail recognisable among the wreckage, he added.

Officials said the fire has been extinguished and South Korea’s transport ministry said the incident happened at 9.03am local time on Sunday (shortly after midnight in the UK).

Authorities are now attempting to confirm the identities of victims using the passenger manifest with aircraft seating positions.

Twenty-two people have been identified so far, according to the Jeonnam Fire Department.

Among those on board were 173 South Koreans and two Thai people, local media reports.

All domestic and international flights from Muan International Airport have been cancelled.

The last time the country suffered a large-scale air disaster was in 2002, when an Air China aircraft crashed into a hill near the airport in Busan, killing 129 people.