they saw the tail of the plane hit the runway, the nose of plane was in the air higher than the tail. so that would seem to suggest that the tail came off after hitting the runway and not before. again, these are early eyewitness accounts. they may contradict one another. they play be inconsistent. the people -- here are more notes from the reporter, associated press. people walking around the outer edge of white foam surrounding the plane. debris scattered on the runway. when the reporter pulled into the parking lot he is could see smoke streaming from the plane. a long line of emergency vehicles pulling up to the runway. several eyewitnesses including some with binoculars saw the come out but didn't see anyone get on them. the view of the plane was obscured for a long period of time by smoke. >> heather: i want to bring this to our viewers. this, of course, the official or some official comments coming from the faa and then we'll bring in our john scott who is standing by. john, you can listen to this, as well. the flight according to the faa, saying so far the flight that crashed w

you lose the tail. nobody is in the tail. and then the plane comes to rest in the medium there and people are able to get off in time before the fire consumes the plane. so all in all, this is really a remarkable story if the earliest reports from those on the plane, and i would note one of them who is tweeting is himself a journalist. all of that would certainly be good news and indicate an amazing survival story here. >> tom costello watching all of this from the d.c. bureau. the headline according to federal officials, nothing sinister here. this is not according to the government at this time. not an indication of terrorism. it appears to be just an awful, awful accident. thank you. to stand by. chloe harrison is with us. 13 years old, i understand. i understand you were on plane at san francisco international airport. >> yes. >> what did you see, chloe? >> we were just sitting waiting for news on what happened and i looked to my right and there was just pillars of smoke coming up. and there was a plane with like the tail

>> back at the tail?heather: in the middle portion of the cabin between the two wings. >> gregg: it looks like it simply burned off. in other words, the top of the plane opposite the belly burned off? >> you know, there is some precedence about this, this is asiana airlines, the thing about whether they are up to snuff as much as they might be. if the aircraft hit the runway hard enough to snap off the tail that is one thing. then they might not survive and hasn't. skipped down the runway but would slow down fast but then do you see and they had fire on top of that, right? >> gregg: yes. it looks like they are pouring water on the top of the plane. i would imagine by now all the passengers are out. it doesn't look like anybody is being pulled from the wreckage at the time. >> that is odd. >> heather: the pictures, like like this was really bad fire on board this plane. it's black, the entire cabin area, zoomed in, from the we said all the way back to just behind the wing, completely black, burned out, ope

that's clearly the tail. that's the tail all right, sure. >> ok. i didn't want to overstep my bounds here. but, again, it looked like -- and the proximity of that tail, it looks like -- >> that pan shot, it's a long way from the aircraft. >> yeah. >> so the plane moves a considerable distance after the tail comes off. >> bob, have you ever seen anything like this? >> oh, yes. no. that sort of pattern, where the plane when it initially hits leaves some vital part, and then skids on down the runway, sure. that's very typical of a crash on landing. >> we should also note here for our viewers, which is probably in terms of vantage point, this is the widest shot we've gotten in several hours. runway 28 l. that's where that aircraft was trying to land essentially. and it crash landed off to the left. and the plane is sitting right now to the left of the runway. you just saw it there. and what bob and i have deduced is the tail of that plane you just saw there a good distance away. but not so far away, bob, from that seawall that we've been talking about

the tail was too high up. it is only when the plane is flying too slow that the tail goes down below the level of the gear. the tail got taken off and the rest of the plane slid down the runway interest that point. one interesting shot that i didn't get a chance to mention. at the very rear of the fuselage you will see a green circular looking thing. that is called the pressure bulkhead. that is what keeps the pressure on the inside of the airplane at the tail area. behind that it is not pressurized. what this shows you is that no one in the cabin -- >> i think we may have just seen it there. i'm not sure. >> no one in the cabin was impacted by hitting the seawall. it was only the tail. >> talk to me about how precisely it would be. we heard from a meteorologist from the weather channel earlier this afternoon. 65 degrees at the time of the landing. partly cloudy. not a foggy day in the bay which is a bit unusual there in the san francisco area sometimes. how would it be that a plane's tail would get that low a

the tail seemed to clip the back of the runway. the tail seemed to fall off, and then the plane came down, hit hard, a hard landing, and then it began to roll, the wing hit, and then it took off and almost like a cartwheel. and then burst into flames. >> wow. well, witnesses tell us they believe that plane was burning for at least 45 minutes, but thankfully most of the people onboard, more than 300 people on board, 16 crew, and the 291 passengers were able to get out. two people did die and 130 people injured. >> remember a few years ago the miracle on he hudson when everybody got off the plane. this is close. when you look at the damage and realize how many people survive, it's really something. >> we want to turn to a guest in the newsroom, u.s. representative eric swalwell. >> your on the science, space and technology committee. tell us what your thoughts are today as you watch this terrible tragedy? >> i fly in and out of that airport twice a week. just went over 100,000 miles two weeks ago. i know that takeoff and that approac

the tail did.e tail was way down which means the plane was flying very slow. >> when the plane crash landed what is the impact going to be like for people on the plane? >> that varied. the normal rate of descent and i think the ntsb guy was talking about it, was the sink rate. normally 700 feet per minute which is not really very rapid. but even so -- >> and again for viewers at home the sink rate in lay men's terms. >> the plane is coming down at a-degree angle and if you are going 160 miles an hour forward then going down at about 700 feet per minute. >> okay. >> so if the plane were to actually touch the runway at that rate it would be a hard landing but wouldn't do any damage. >> no damage? >> not if it hit the runway. >> okay. >> but in this case the plane hit the seawall the tail was taken off and the impact could have been significant. >> we should note some of this is speculation, none of this is confirmed. we are basing this on eyewitness testimony if you will. we are basing it on some of

everything except the tail.here else. >> and that is what we have been looking at over the course of the afternoon and evening. the tail that is quite a distance away from the boeing 777. as you heard and then saw all of this go down, pamela, what is going through your mind? >> i couldn't really believe what i was seeing. i'm actually from alabama here for the fourth of july as well as a nurse and on an assign hment here. i was just here for an overnight stay. i had been watching planes go in and come out all night and all day and didn't think anything of actually seeing a plane like crash on the runway. it is kind of hard to put into words something that i have seen on tv but not actually witnessed. >> when you saw the folks that you mentioned who were walking away from the plane in an orderly fashion, where did they go? >> could you tell whether they were going into the terminal? could you tell whether they were just trying to get away from the plane and just waiting on the runway or waiting in the nearby fiel

and we are talking a little bit about the tail there and you can see. referred to that as a bulkhead area and it is open where the tail separated. the tail itself, part was in the water in the top of the runway, the end of the runway, and spread apart in pieces throughout the runway leading to the crash site. >> what do you think happen? >> i think he landed short of that and we have to pursue the reasons for the tail low landing. the captain could have been incapacitated and he had a high descent rate of 1400 feet a second coming down. 1400 feet a minute coming down and in so doing, he might have just overshot and knocked the tail off. but there could be an overroadway of the autolanding system on the aircraft. he was probably handling the aircraft himself at the time. >> we appreciate your insight as always. >> we'll have more reaction and how it is impacting other airports, stay with us. you know throughout history, folks have suffered from frequent heartburn. but getting heartburn and then treating day after day is a thing of the past. block the aci

the tail broke off, as you can see, you don't see a tail there. the top of the fuselage in flames as you can see. it burned. witnesses say pieces of the wings and other parts were flying off of this plane. we do the know how many people were on the plane, how many of those were hurt. possibly worse. we're still getting information now. we did see the emergency slides deployed from the side of this wreckage. we have new information now that i need to read to you that is coming from the coast guard. here's what it says. lieutenant -- a lieutenant junior grade of the coast guard at san francisco district said, we asked to confirm reports that the u.s. coast guard conducting a search had found a body. that's what we did. and here's what they tell to us. or say to us. i cannot confirm that. i know that there has been a helicopter launched. and we are assisting the responding agencies, but other than that, nothing else has been confirmed at this time. so, cnn asking to confirm reports that the u.s. coast guard was conducting a search and had found a bod

the tail was very low. that seem to be what caused it. >> then after it came to a stop, after it avoided the other aircraft. first of all, how close did it get to the other plane on the runway? >> it is impossible to tell. it went behind it. the other jet that was on the runway was actually between us and the crashing plane. so we couldn't see how close it got. >> did you see the emergency vehicles respond? did you see the response? >> you know, we were very troubled by what we had seen, obviously. so we actually left the scene. we saw the emergency flags come out. we felt like that was a good sign that there were at least some survivors west just very disturbed. we left as the emergency crew was arriving so we did not see the emergency crews treating the plane. >> you mentioned that as you saw it approach, you said that the angle was wrong. what do you mean by that? just the fact that the tail was too low? or was there something else wrong the plane? >> yeah. the tail was too low instead of coming in flat,

the tail touched down and crashed. then soon after it went up in a lot of smoke, and that smoke billowed out for several minutes. about five minutes after the crash, according to eyewitnesses, that's when the passengers started getting off that plane. and we spoke with one of the passengers, one of the survivors who said one of the ramps to get off that plane was not working so a lot of people were just jumping off the plane. about five feet from the plane itself to the tarmac. >> monty francis just outside the airport. a lot of people were spending the day there. having fun, right after the fourth of july weekend and they witnessed this firsthand. seeing that plane come in and then seeing the smoke. >> reporter: that's right. we're here at burlingame. they're here for a different reason to see the wreckage of this crash. this morning, dozens of people witnessed the immediate aftermath of the crash and a handful of people actually saw the crash landing itself. >> i heard a boom. >> reporter: brian was in his hotel room

the tail was clipped. the tail came off.died in this accident, two 16-year-old girls from china. they were on their way to the u.s.. they were here for a trip for the summer. those girls passed away. we have a dozen other in critical conditions. >> if do you have a flight out of sfo, delays up to nine hours today because of a lot of folks that were supposed to board yesterday. >>> in other news, developing in redwood city, firefighters evacuated several people out of an apartment complex that went up in flames. 60 people taken to the hospital because of it and red cross drove bus loads of people to a make-shift evacuation center. >>> brian has his eye on the weather. >> starting out cloudy along the shoreline. we'll recover to mostly sunny conditions. the sun is breaking down. forecast high here, 65. 79 for san jose and 87 at livermore. extended forecast, a little bit of a warming trend be peak tuesday. we'll still have the usual clouds in the morning. eight latter half of the week, more to big changes. have a pleasant sunda

as the it does that the tail dips down. we have apparently what happened here. the tail hits first. that causes loss of all control. in fact it is quite remarkable this many people survived this crash because it was pretty dramatic when it hit that tail and the tail came off. >> all right. so we have some sound bites too. that you will be able to hear from one of the witnesses that was on the plane. is you could just imagine, steven, the question i want to know -- at what point. until they hit the tail were the passengers on board even aware that something main have been going wrong? just, speculation here, obviously. >> terrific question. >> a lot of times you come in. a little bumpy. you don't think the tail is going to hit and fall off. >> there is little doubt, exempt for william levy, raj and i talked to who was very aware what was going on. if you are watching a movie. preparing for a land. everything seems to be fine. apparently the pilot thought everything was fine until the last few second. yes, jessica, to answer your question, i can imagine there were many people on board

the tail ripped off. witnesses say the plane was landing then the back of the plane hit the ground, at the very edge of the runway. then the plane spun around. throwing aircraft parts and debris across the tarmac. >> it looked normal at first. it was taking the same ainge that they always come in, like this and wheels were down. and then i -- it was wrong, three, five seconds out i said -- i started calling to my fiancee, i said, this didn't look right, this doesn't look right. and the wheels, there were too low, too soon. so this is the runway. came in look this. and i was watching the wheels and it just hit like that and the whole thing collapsed immediately. in never had a chance. >> what followed impact, passengers able to escape the burning plane onnen natable emergency slides. after a stop off the runway, we heard from the san francisco fire chief, here's the latest numbers. 307 people were on board that flight. of those, 182 taken to area hospitals. 49 of those were seriously injured. some critical

the tail broke off the plane. the fuselage at the top, you can see partially burned, most of it is gone, and as you look at this picture right now, you can see there is no tail section, there is no rudder on this plane. we did see the emergency slides deploy as well. and we're getting all sorts of new information here as well. i'm being told just at the top of the hour in just a few minutes there's going to be a press conference in san francisco. there's going to be another press conference at the bottom of the hour at 5:30 eastern time from washington and the faa. we can also tell you this, a national security officials tells cnn there are no signs of terrorism from this crash, that flights have been canceled in and out of san francisco's international airport. many of them because it's a large airport have been diverted to l.a.x., i know there are other airports that are closer, but l.a.x. is a much bigger airport and can absorb some of the plane -- some of the planes and flights that are coming in more readily

the tail ripped off.ck of the plane hit the ground, at the very edge of the runway. then the plane spun around. throwing aircraft parts and debris across the tarmac. >> it

witnesses saying the tail of the plane clipping the run way.nd and belly lid on the tarmac and then burst into flames. there was a total of 307 passengers and crew on the flight. all passengers and crew accounted for, two people confirmed dead. we are told that the two deaths held chinese passports. using a diagram, check it out, we look at the debris, trying find out what it can tell us about the deadly crash. >> reporter: well we have partially recreated the crash scene based on what we have been able to see in the pictures and video so far. so follow me from the left side of the screen to the right. on the far left, you can see debris in the water and a debris trail where the land meets the water. in that same vicinity, the wheels of the plane and the tip of the tail, now, shift your eyes to the right a little and that is where the vertical stabilizer fell, and this is what is the vertical stabilizer, this part of the tail. to the right of that is the horizontal stabilizers and that is this section of the tail, when you look to the right of

we've spent a fair amount of time looking at the tail of this plane, what's left of the tail of this plane, and based on what we've seen and based on the eyewitness accounts that we've heard on our air, it sounds as if this plane was, obviously, way too low to land when it came in, does it not? >> absolutely. earlier, we were just talking about on the carrier, coming down with your tail hook just 12 feet or so above the deck. when you come across the end of the runway, not the overrun, not the safety area, but over the very end of the runway that you're okay to land on, you're about 50 feet above the runway. now, in this case, they've got about a thousand foot of overrun. he should have been at about 150 feet above that when he hit it. that's a huge error. and it's pretty hard for anyone at this point to figure a good reason for that. and it's one of those two things, as you discussed. it's either pilot error it's unable to get the power on the engine. >> two dead, 181 taken to the hospital, one person still unaccounted for. we are keeping a close eye on the hospitals in the san fran

. >> the tail was very low. when it hit, sparks flew, and then it -- for some reason he must have lost control, this wing hit, it spun around and then there was a big explosion. >> i heard two loud bangs. i immediately turned around. i was here walking on this end of the land, and i looked over and saw the plane with the fuselage very high angle from the ground. it was probably almost 45 degrees. the tail assembly had now been broken loose. >> reporter: back live, that seems to be what a lot of -- this is the millbrae waterfront where dozens of people have been arriving today on this holiday weekend with their cameras, cell phones, watching the fuselage across the bay as it sits there and the investigation begins. there's a sweeping pattern, and as wayne mentioned, yes, planes have been taking off and landing on the perpendicular run raye. there are no air operations near the crash site behind me. since we're here, we may try this. behind me, you can see the fuselage that is still there and will be there for som

you can see the tail laying there. and we've been talking about the tail just laying there. but look at the size of that! upon that's bigger than a -- that's bigger than a fire truck just laying on the ground! and that's the portion of the plane that literally ripped off and sent people falling out of the back of the plane. this is a gentleman we interviewed earlier in the afternoon. you couldn't see his arms in the interview. but he has a wrist band on, and then he has a hurt arm. one of the many victims. >> i had my family, my wife and son with me. ♪ [ inaudible ] ♪ >> frightening? >> oh, yes , of course. >> why you were flying to san francisco? >> i don't live here. i came here to meet my brother. ♪ [ inaudible ] ♪ ♪ >> the sound was pretty loud, and the landing was very hard, and we knew that something has gone wrong. and we could sense that something terrible has happened. ♪ [ inaudible ] ♪ ♪ >> it's a little hard -- you are tense, and your instincts take over. you don't really know what is happening around you. you just hold onto something. >> did it get quiet after th

the entire tail of the jumbo jet was broken off and the top of the fuselage completely burned away. flight 214 was operate by asia na airlines. it stopped in seoul before stopping in san francisco. officials are going to hold a news conference later this morning, but right now let's go to jong yang. a very early morning to you. we thank you for the early morning wakeup. what can you tell us about the investigation that happened? >> well, alex, that investigation has begun. investigators of the nags tiona transportation safety board arrived here yesterday to figure out what exactly happened. the black box, the data recorders that perform all the data of the -- record all the movement of all the instrumentes have been recovered. they'll be sent back to washington for review. that way they can figure out exactly what happened, what was going on in that aircraft at the time of this accident. we do know that during this 10 1/2-hour flight from seoul to san francisco, the pilot reported no issues. he had not reported any sort of problems or declared any sort of emergency before he tried t

poses of the tail laying in the runway. this picture showing survivors walking away from the wreckage that was remarkable. as we told you, not everyone got out. a team is is not to investigate what went wrong. this is not a live look at the airport. we are told that two-run ways have reopened. the airport right on the water south of san francisco. and that is where we will find cloudia cowan wo is standing by with the latest. claudia? heather, mayor lee call today a tragic day for san francisco. and judging by the numbers, the tragedy will grow in scope. two people are dead and 130 people hospitalized and as many as 67 people still unaccounted for at this hour. officials making it clear it is a fluid situation. we know that many of the injuries, listen. >> we have seen burns, fractures, internal injures and patients who needed to go immediately to the operating room and patients who had to go in to intensive care. >> the weather was mild when the flight was ready it land in san francisco, with throw -- 307 souls on board. t

the investigation could take months but the tail shows a tail strike where the tail hits the ground first and in this case ls severed from the aircraft. that could indicate the plane was flying too low and too slow and makes the airspeed, how fast it was going, among the first thing investigators want to know. mark is a safety consultant for "cbs news" and the former chairman of the ntsb. >> the flight data recorder is going to tell me what the speed was, what the altitude was, if act the gea down, if all of the flaps were in the right position, where the yolk was, did the flare occur too early or too late? nt the flare refers to the nose up orientation that is normal during most landings but was too high during this one. investigators will want to know why. experts tell "cbs news" the tail strike landing and crash has three most likely causes. pilot error, instrument failure, ar a last-second gust of wind, a wind shear capable of driving the plane into the ground in the critical seconds before contact. >> reporter: in this crash, investigators do is v. a lot to work with, both the voice

that rudder input caused tremendous stress on the tail, the vertical stabilizer but the tail that is sticking up. it causes stress on that which induced a yaw and the tail broke off and at that point the aircraft wasn't controllable. this, you are not accelerating you are decelerating and you are slower to land. when they pull the black boxes, will tell air speed, engine settings, whether the engines were spoolg up or down. what the rate of descent was and take that and put that in simulator and sit there in that simulator and ride through the final moments of approach. >> heather: two different aircraft that we're talking about and two different situations. one taking off and one landing. >> yes. >> heather: and one other question about the fire itself that broke out after the plane landed. you can see it did appear to break out on one side of the plane above the wing section area. that would be where some of the fuel was stored. >> right. >> heather: according to jon scott. perhaps that is why these passengers were able to evacuate and hopefully all of them safely according to the

and then i seen the tail section of the plane strike the tarmac. and, you know, it struck and then bounced forward and then got a little bit of airborne and, you know, kind of flipped over and kind of came in to view with my camera and then there was an explosion as far as -- we weren't sure there was some like orange or kind of gray colored vest but there wasn't fire at first and then, you know, fire kind of started after it settled. >> yeah. as we're looking at -- that was my next question to ask you. when you look at this sort of orange-colored dust as you were saying, it almost looks like an explosion. hang on, fred. so this is that plane coming in. and just as the edge of the runway, right there, it clips -- see it flips the edge of the runway? that was the first moment of impact and when investigators believe the tail section may have fallen off and that's what initially they believe. >> not, the tail section -- oh, i'm sorry. >> go ahead, fred. >> no. the tail section, as far as what i could see, it did not fall off until impact. >> until im

this is what is left in the plane, the tail of the craft ripped off. the plane was landing, when the back hit the ground at the rear edge of the run way. the plane spun around, throwing aircraft parts and debris. >> it looked normal at first, it was taking the angle that they always take in, like this, wheels were down, and then i heard -- i knew something was wrong, three or five seconds out, i started calling to my fiance and saying, this doesn't look right, this doesn't look right. and the wheels, they were too low, too soon. so, this is the runway. it came in like this. and i was just watching the wheels and it just hit like that and the whole thing collapsed immediately. it never really had a chance. >> passengers were able to escape the burning plane on the inflatable emergency slides after the craft came to a stop. authorities now say everyone aboard flight 214 is accounted for. we know there were 307 people on board the flight. of those, 182 were taken to hospital. 49 of them were seriously injured and some critically and incredibly 123 people

the tail much too low and the nose of the plane high. now to san francisco general hospital where three waves of casualties have been admitted. there are a total of 53 patients there. two are children. the first wave of passengers arrived around 12:30 yesterday afternoon, ten in critical condition. many were brought in on again anies. the collector of the emergency department gave a description of some of the injuries. >> we see a lot of bumps and bruises and contusion. level with long bone fractures. but we've seen a lot of patients with spine injuries. i'm guessing it's from the force of the plane going down on the long axis of the spine so we have patients with spinal compression fractures or cervical spine fractures. >> there are some patients who have already been discharged. sf general said it also transferred some regular patients to laguna hospital to free up beds for the plane crash victims. >> stanford hospital is planning to update the condition of the passengers taken there in about an hour or so. you see an ambulance and sev

and then i could see the tail was in the air.i could see that the tail just completely came off. >> doctors spend their lives train to go respond to a tragedy like we witnessed yesterday. at san francisco general hospital, they were ready when the victims started to flood in. elizabeth cohen looks at the kind of injuries they had to treat. >> area hospitals are seeing a wide range of injuries, everything from the minor to the really severe. let's take a look at them about so they have been seeing cuts and bruises, broken bone, spinal fractures, burns and internal bleeding. in situations like this, there are certain kinds of injuries that doctors worry the most about. for example, head injuries. trauma to the brain can cause bleeding inside the skull. the brain doesn't have any room. that's immediately life threatening. another kindf injury and another one that you can't really see is internal bleeding in the abdomen. that also can be immediately life threatening if doctors or paramedics see that someone is in great abdominal pain

i sort caught the tail end. i didn't see, i saw the plane flip up and slam down and a little bit later it exploded. there was black smoke all over the place. >> arthel: that was an eyewitness account of a fisherman nearby. it appears, rick, from the various eyewitnesses we have spoken with, everybody seems to talk about the problem at the last minute of that landing there on runway 28 left in the san francisco airport. asiana flight 214 coming from south korea scheduled to land at 11:26 a.m. we are awaiting a news conference from the san francisco airport. as we just reported that n.t.s.b. is on the way. we have three west coast based investigators. they will get their first and around 7:00 pacific, 9:00 rest of crew will should be arriving there. they will be looking into every angle of this flight at the crash landing. boeing triple 7 involved in the boeing company is cooperating with the investigation. also korean air, they are on board with the investigations. that is where the flight originated from. they w

saying the tail hit first. >> so, the tail hit. the flames came out and started to cartwheel and then it looked like -- i couldn't tell if it slid or not and then all of a sudden, it was in flames. >> reporter: tonight, a clearer portrait of the wreckage. where that tail ended up. sheared off and sitting on the runway. 2,000 feet of debris. further back, the landing gear. and at the gunning of the runway, near the sea wall, the horizontal and vertical stabilizers ripped off the plane. so crucial to helping that jet land safely. with seconds to spare, the air traffic controllers here knew that the hundreds of passengers and crew on that jet were in trouble. >> 214 heavy, emergency vehicles are responding. >> reporter: 11:35 pacific time, just minutes after flight 214 began that final approach, it had crashed. rescue crews now racing to the runway. they arrived to find the chutes already deployed. the flight crews helping the passengers off. those passengers with life-threatening injuries, compressed spines from the sheer force of th

the plane's tail in pieces. we're waiting to hear about the passengers and we have a press conference with the national transportation and safety board. it should happen at any moment now. in the meanwhile i want to get to robert francis, a former ntsb vice chairman, it's a little premature to say what happened or guess what happened to this plane, the peak passengers wer evacuated very quickly. we are looking at huge damage to this plane. one of the passenger's daughters said he expected it, mr. thompson -- he expected it, mr. francis, excuse me, and it appeared to him the plane came this and it was really low. it came in too low and he tried to pull it back up when this happened. does that make sense to you at all? what do you make of that? >> i make sense that that could have happened, but until the investigators get there and start to look at the flight data recorders and the cockpit voice recorders and whatever film was taken, i don't think that one passenger is in -- unless he's a very experienced pilot an

hull. >> the tail? >> it's broken. yes. a big hole. the passengers near the -- the plane tail just walk out from this hole. >> think about how extraordinary that must be to be seated at the rear of the plane and then suddenly look out, turn around and that's all gone, it's a big hole you're walking out of, carrying your injured child. this is one of the many many remarkable stories we're hearing on the go around. >> incredible. are doctors saying anything about whether they expect any to be released today? >> reporter: i'm sorry. can you say that one more time? >> are doctors say iing anythin about whether any patients might be released today? >> reporter: there are other patients kind of coming and going. it's hard to say if there are going to be any more released. what the hospital would say is that the extent of the other injuries ranged from serious to fair to good. it is very possible other patients may be leaving today which will certainly be very good news. >> very hopeful. thanks so much, kyung

runway and the tail came off, and the spin ended up just short of taxiway f there. now with want to show you a map of this airport. this is essentially runways 1-9, r and l and also 1 from this direction. this is 2-8 l, where the airplane is currently right now. that's where the crash happened. this is 2-8 r. that's the longest runway that sfo has. it handles the biggest airplanes and it's over 11,000 feet long. this runway is over 10,000 feet long. these two runways will remain closed until the ntsb concludes its investigation. and more just as importantly, the ntsb is going to canvas this area, because that's where damage is on the runway. they want to make sure the runway is safe because they start having planes take off and land. it could be several days before all four runways are open again. that will impact air travel for days to come. >> so a huge domino effect. teach, those are the two longer runways, so in theory, that will be affecting the international flights, the bigger planes. >> that's right. the really big planes have to use the longer runways. they

if we had some sort of tail dragging, the nose was high and the tail dragged like they had a sudden losspower or control that caused the plane to come tail down first and the rest of the body slammed down. it is conjecture at this nothing more than that. the nose is in good shape. the tail may have come down firt point, you had a fire. probably originating in those engines. the fire is limited to the middle of the fuselage. it didn't get into the cockpit and it didn't spread all the way back to the tail section or the rear of the plane. you got to wonder if this wasn't a situation where for whatever reason, they were coming in nose pitch high, tail hit the ground first and then the rest of the plane slammed down. >> we're watching now this fire truck spraying that white fire retardant on the wreckage there. as you pointed out, it seemed as if emergency personnel was either standing by, prepared for this or their response was pretty dog gone quick. the weather in san francisco right now, tom, it is not raining. it doesn't appear to be terribly cloudy. do we know any more about the conditi

nowhere near each other. >> that tail is a lot closer to the seawall.o appears to be, for all practical intents and purposes, from this vantage point, the seawall appears to be in tact too. >> reporter: the seawall, the whole section of it appears to be in tact. i don't know if there's a little portion of it missing. i would have a hard time believing that the seawall didn't have some kind of impact damage from a jetliner knocking it, but it appears to be in tact. of course, they're not using this runway right now and the only -- i see another emergency vehicle, actually, some movement on emergency vehicles over there right now, by the fuselage area. i don't know if they're just coming in to relieve people who are there, but it's the first time i've actually seen vehicles moving around there for a while right now. >> all right. noelle walker, on the scene for us there in the san francisco bay area. noelle, thank you so much. do appreciate your reporting. i want to bring in milissa rehberger now. milissa rehberger, once again, has been closely monitoring

apparently, we understand this was a little bit of a tail wind. the plane was a little higher than it should have been. and suddenly, in order to correct for that with the tail wind pushing it, again, you need to get down so it takes a little steeper glide path. we also must point out that the glide path electronic equipment on 28 l was not working. it was a visual flight rule. so that's been confirmed by sfo. nothing wrong with that commercial pilots do it all the time. in this case, the plane made a steeper descent and essentially, got too low. it cost lift. it didn't have power. the pilot apparently tried to overcorrect, tried to get more air under him. get more lift. so essentially, pointed the nose of the plane up which is exactly what the witnesses say happened. and when he did that, you see he is still over the water. he is trying to get more lift and touchdown. when he did that, the nose went up, the tail went down and scraped along the rock barrier between san francisco bay and the end of runway 28 l. that apparently caused quite a hard h

the plane is going up, and you don't know if it's a tail spin or not.> lucky indeed. calling it surreal, the experience of being on the boeing 777 which crashed and burned at san francisco international airport. we'll hear from an expert on why it may have crash landed, and what we can hope to learn from the black boxes. good morning, i'm bianna golodryga. >> and i'm dan harris, this is sunday, july 7th. also fascinating and possibly life saving information. the decisions you can make in the moment that might make a huge difference. >> let's start with recapping when we know about the crash of flight 214. two people, 16-year-old girls from china died in the crash. out of the 307 people on the plane, 291 were passengers, 16 crew. 182 people were taken to local hospitals, 49 of them are in critical condition. this morning after confusing and scary hours, all of the passengers have finally been accounted for. >> let's bring in abc news aviation consultant, certainly steven for more details. he joins us from washington. based on what we know, i want to ask

they say the tail hit the ground and then ripped off. one witness says a giant fire ball simply developed from under the plane and the airliner flew into the grass as passengers evacuated and emergency crews rushed in. here's what we know right now and i must admit there is a lot we don't know. here is what we know. there are at least 28 people in hospitals in the area. san francisco general hospital says they have ten ctically injured and two children. they also are expecting 15 more patients. we also know that there were 291 passengers on the plane and 16 crew members. 61 of the passengers we are told are americans. and the ntsb, national transportation safety board, is sending what they call a go team to san francisco to begin this investigation. people were -- who were on that plane already shared some pictures with us. this is what they saw. smoke pouring out of the plane. flames in the windows. people jumping down the emergency slides and trying to rush away from that plane as quickly as possible. we also have audio from the air tr

and then, the tail. >> she confirm that had two flight attendants sitting at the very rear of the plane were ejected upon impact. they were found badly injured but they did survive. >> because asiana is not a u.s. carrier it's crew members were not required to undergo drug and alcohol testing. >> we're learning more from a heroic flight attendant. she says the captain delayed this evacuation after the flight hit the ground. >> after the plane stopped completely, i went in to see whether the captain was alive. i knocked the door. the captain opened it. i asked are you okay, captain? he said yes. i'm okay. i asked should i perform evacuation, he told me to wait so i made an announcement because passengers were upset and things were confusing. i said, ladies and gentlemen, our plane has stopped. please remain seated. the plane will not move anymore. >> unclear why anyone would instruct passengers to wait but the 40-year-old has been hailed for saving lives and carrying a child child on her back. only later did she learn she suffered a broken tail bone. >> the family of two chinese girls ar

that is the tail. that's the tail. >> right. >> of that boeing 777. all of that wreckage right there. you can see what's going on. you see folks walking around there as well. this is videotape that we shot earlier. they're walking around looking at that tail. help me question mary schiavo. you're an expert on this subject. ask her what you want. >> mary, are you hearing anything, and this is just chatter out there in the big wide blogosphere, twittersphere, whatever you want to call it. are you hearing anything about the ils system at san francisco airport? the instrument landing system. whether it was operational today. >> yes, there's lots of talk about whether that was operational, whether there was a possibility that the pilots had not properly readjusted or set their altimeters and other strumting co instruments coming in. also, of course, there will be the issue in the investigation of the configuration of the runway and the seawall at the end which is, of course, necessary. but on the pilot chatter lines, obviously there's lots of talk about wh

tail ripped off, most everyone seems fine. i am okay. surreal." and this photo is a photo taken at impact. it's a little difficult to see, but you can make out the plane and the smoke trailing behind. another photo also taken from close range shows san francisco fire crews stationed at the airport dousing the plain with foam. many of the photos sent to our newsroom were taken moments after the crash. and some of from passengers who evacuated the plane and were waiting for help on the tarmac. and then this is this photo of a passenger ben levy, his wife tweeting his photo from the hospital, being treated for broken ribs of she says her husband sitting in an exit row and helped about 50 people evacuate from the plane. >> ktvu's joan sasaki is live at sf generality where first- responders brought more than 50 of the injured. >> reporter: julie, we have been here since early this afternoon and watched dozens of people brought in. that patient ben levy stopped to share his harrowing story. >> those are the people in the hospital with their families. >>

that is like a big tail. >> the fish tail that will go down in history. >> it is the cup song like you have never heard before. >> this is the cancer cup song. ♪ i won't miss cancer when it is gone ♪ >> find out why this rendition is to >>> it was a dark and quiet night off of the coast of norway when this fishing vessel got a hit. it was a big one. this all recorded for the show "hook" and these guys battled a behemoth. >> and you can't see anything. but it is close to the boat. >> by the time they got it close to the boat, the sheer excitement on the guys' faces, and you can see that this thing is huge. >> whoa, that is a fin? it is like a whale. >> did they catch a whale? >> they caught what is called a greenland shark or gray shark it is also known as, and this guy here is doing some raw calculations saying that this thing is 2,514 pounds. >> what kind of fishing line are you fishing with that it does not break the line. >> do you get that on the boat or tow to shore. >> it is bigger that on the boat. >> and thankfully, no, they don't put it on the boat. these guys release this big

one body was found near the tail of the plane, the second body was found near the fuselage, just before the inflatable chute near the wing. the coroner said he will perform taemss on both victims later today to determine the exact cause of death. there are indications that the girl was traveling with at least one other person, but officials have nauot been able to track tt person down alt this point. there was a group of teenage exchange students on the plane, but no word on whether she was part of the group. investigators are now working with the chinese consulate to contact the family as well. and our coverage of the asiana airlines crash continues. still ahead, we'll hear from some of the people who witnessed that horrifying crash from the ground. >>> as our asiana airlines cr h crashed at sfo, many people on the ground watched it happen and stood helpless as the giant plume of smoke began to spread, wondering what was happening. we talked with some of the witnesses on the ground. >> i heard kind of a boom, a thunderous boom, and i paused for a second and turned around and looked out

investigators revealed today they found debris from the plane's tail section in the water beyond the edge of the runway, evidence impact occurred well before the runway began. n.t.s.b. chairman woman deborah hersman. >> the lower portion of the tail cone is in the rocks at the sea wall. there is also debris from the sea wallow kateed several hundred feet up the runway. >> reporter: the initial examination of the boeing 777's voice and data recorders report everything was normal when the crew disengaged the autopilot on the approach to san francisco. the weather perfect, the conversation with the tower routine. from his home on a hillside over looking the airport, this man thought he spotted something wrong. >> what caught my attention was it was a little wobbly coming in for the landing. it didn't look like the way planes do when they're landing. i a normal descent to runway 28 left requires an angle that keeps jets above san francisco bay. in an window seat, benjamin levy started to worry. >> i saw water and realized we were way too low but i thought "he knows what he's doing." >> r

the knows was deafening as they hit the runway and the tail broke up. many evacuated quickly deploying the evacuation shoots but nobody panicked and people got out of the burning jet as quick as possible. >> the moment it hit, there was a loud bang and we knew something was wrong. >> did you see fire? >> the fire started as people started evacuating. >> the two passengers killed were part of a middle school group of students that planned to spend the summer in california. they were on their way to a summer camp in los angeles. and they were also scheduled to visit stanford university, as well as other colleges. live in the newsroom, abc7 news. >> cornell, thank you. one of the many passengers who survived was a teenage boy. here he is in the yellow t-shirt. he briefly spoke to reporters at sfo about the moment of impact and what it was like for him before a police officer rushed him away. >> it was going up and down and then -- something like that's correct i'm not sure. and then it hit the ground and then -- yeah. >> and what happened next? >> where we

witnesses told me they heard -- the plane. >> all of a sudden we saw the plane land and the tail end of it went down, and all of a sudden we saw smoke, and we thought the plane cracked in half. >> of the 291 passengers, two are confirm dead. among the injured, 49 have critical to serious. 123 people were not injured and actually able to self-evacuate ask then were taken to a safety zone at the airport. >> one person is missing. that's down from 60 some odd we heard a little while ago. one person is missing and authorities are trying to locate that person. >> the flight originated in shanghai, china, and had a stopover in seoul, south korea. >> and asiana airline officials say 149 chinese nationals were onboard. 77 south koreans and 61 american citizens. >> federal aviation experts say this kind of plane, the boeing 777 has a good safety record. >> it does indeed. sky 7hd shows investigators on the ground, walking in a line to pick up evidence. national transportation safety board released a statement saying these jets have just one other major accident in its 18 years of service. >>

the tail end was in the air. the tail end came back down and it continued to spin on the runway. >> eric: could you hear anything? did you hear any of the engines -- >> no. i was inside. i couldn't really hear anything. >> eric: when you saw what you saw and the plane came to a rest in that smoke, what did you do? >> i really -- i just stood there. i felt so helpless. i couldn't -- i didn't know whether to call 911 or to... just stand there and watch. so i just stood there and watched. >> eric: did you see people coming out of the plane? what was the nextç step? >> well, about 2, 3 minutes after the plane hit, the slide ejected out and i could see through my camera lens that people were -- [inaudible] >> eric: can you repeat that, i'm sorry. >> about 2 or 3 minutes after the plane crashed, the slides ejected out of the side of the >> again, i think that's a testament to how great an airplane bog makes. >> jamie: before that tail hit, is there any warn that this pilot might have had? what is the earliest. >> that