A passenger on the doomed Jeju Air plane that crashed in South Korea killing 177 people sent a chilling message to a loved one just minutes before the tragedy unfolded
A Jeju Air plane crashed after colliding with a wall upon landing in South Korea, but before that fatal moment a passenger sent a chilling five-word plea to a family member. The horrifying incident at Muan International Airport claimed the lives of at least 177 individuals on Sunday morning, with emergency services still searching through the rubble.
The Jeju Air flight 7C2216, en route from Bangkok with an estimated 181 on board, met its tragic end after it was completely engulfed in flames. It is currently understood that just two crew members survived.
Local media reported that right before the crash a passenger managed to send a text to a loved one. A man identified only as Mr A by South Korean press shared that he was at the airport awaiting his relatives’ arrival when the catastrophe occurred.
In a heart-breaking statement, he described how, after being alerted to a problem with the aircraft by his family, all communication ceased. With a pang of dread, he disclosed their final message: “Should I make a will?” reports the Mirror.
Additional reports suggested passengers were alerted of avian trouble, with one passenger messaging about a bird getting “caught on the wing and we couldn’t land. ” Another had reportedly sent out a dire farewell: “Should I say my last words? ” to a family member just moments before the disaster unfolded.
The National Fire Agency of South Korea has reported that 71 of the bodies retrieved from the crashed aircraft were identified as male and another 71 as female, with the genders of at least nine other passengers still to be confirmed. Only two flight attendants have been rescued from the wreckage and are currently in hospitals with injuries ranging from medium to severe.
A local fire official disclosed to distraught families, according to the Straits Times: “Passengers were ejected from the aircraft after it collided with the wall, leaving little chance of survival. The plane is almost completely destroyed, and identifying the deceased is proving difficult. The process is taking time as we locate and recover the remains.”
All operations at Muan Airport have been suspended following the tragedy. The South Korean Land, Infrastructure and Transport Ministry has initiated a probe into the cause of the crash.
The National Fire Agency suspects that the aircraft suffered a malfunction with its landing gear due to a bird strike, which is an incident where a bird hits an aircraft during flight, takeoff, or landing. This calamity marks the most catastrophic plane crash involving a South Korean airline since a Korean Air disaster in Guam in 1997, which claimed 200 lives.
The deadliest accident on South Korean soil occurred in April 2002 when an Air China flight went down, resulting in 129 fatalities.
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