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South Korea began a weeklong national mourning period following the worst aviation disaster on Korean soil. A hundred seventy-nine people on a flight from Thailand were killed when their plane skidded off the runway, hit a wall and exploded into flames. Only two people survived the crash. NPR's Anthony Kuhn was at the airport with the bereaved families. And a warning - this story contains graphic details about the disaster's aftermath.
ANTHONY KUHN, BYLINE: The international departures hall of the Muan International Airport is packed with the friends and families of passengers, and the hall is filled with tents and emergency shelters for people to rest in. Occasionally, out of the tents come cries and sobs of anguish.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: (Screams).
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: (Screams).
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: (Screams).
KUHN: With the passengers on the Jeju Air flight all accounted for and no possibility of finding more survivors, all that's left is the grim business of releasing the bodies to the families and determining the cause of the crash. At a tense meeting between officials and victims' relatives, one woman, who doesn't give her name, complains that no autopsy reports have been issued, and no victims have been given funerals.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #3: (Shouting in Korean).
KUHN: "Not a single autopsy report," she says. "What are you doing - just coming in and going out with that official badge?"
NA WON-O: (Speaking Korean).
KUHN: The official identifies himself as Na Won-o, the provincial police officer in charge of investigating the accident. He apologizes for the delay in delivering the bodies back to their families.
NA: (Through interpreter) I now have a list of five people we can hand over to their families.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #3: (Shouting in Korean).
KUHN: "Just five?" the woman shrieks in disbelief. "Between yesterday and today - just five?"
NA: (Through interpreter) I'm sorry to put it so bluntly, but even the five bodies are severely damaged. Most have lost body parts. We have finished identifying the 179 bodies, but there are 606 severed parts.
KUHN: And, Na adds, the bodies can't be returned to the families until all the parts are properly sorted out. Meanwhile, investigators probing the exact cause of the crash are just getting started. They've interviewed air traffic controllers. They've sent data recorders to Seoul for evaluation. They'll comb through Boeing 737-800 maintenance records, all of which is likely to take months or longer.
Anthony Kuhn, NPR News, Muan County, South Korea. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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