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Officials Hold Briefing on Las Vegas Cybertruck Explosion; Sheriff: FBI, ATF Assisting Investigation Into Cybertruck Blast; FBI: Motive of Cybertruck Explosion is Unknown so Far. Aired 9:15-9:22p ET

Aired December 28, 2024 - 21:15   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

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[21:16:14]

JESSICA DEAN, CNN HOST: I'm Jessica Dean in New York. We have breaking News. At least 28 people are dead after a South Korean airliner crashed while landing. The plane was carrying 175 passengers and 6 crew members. This happened just after 9 a.m. local time Sunday morning about two hours ago at the Muan Airport. Muan is a city in the country's southwest region. We are told rescues are ongoing. Two people have remarkably been pulled from that wreckage.

CNN correspondent Mike Valerio is joining us now from Seoul, South Korea. And obviously these images, Mike, are very startling. What more can you tell us?

MIKE VALERIO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: They are heart stopping, Jessica. And right now, the country's acting President has ordered all available resources to head towards this airport. That's about a three and a half hour drive from where we're standing here in Seoul, the capital, to make sure that everything can possibly be done to save more lives. As you mentioned, two people already rescued. There is the feeling that perhaps, more people, again, emphasizing the word perhaps, can be rescued according to local media reports from the tail section of the aircraft, the rear section of the aircraft.

So Jessica, before we came on the air a couple seconds ago, a couple key facts that we've been able to confirm. This is an American-made aircraft. We've confirmed It's a Boeing 737-800, again, 28 people dead. And we are expecting from conversations with local fire departments that that figure could rise. This started as a flight from Bangkok. This is Jeju Air, which is South Korea's largest budget airline that was founded in 2005.

If you want to get to a destination, be it Jeju island here in South Korea, Bangkok, any of the regional major tourist attractions, Jeju Air is a way that people go on a budget, a relatively strong safety record. But besides this plume of smoke that we're looking at, we're starting to review other images, and verifying these images, and pieces of video that have been coming into us here at CNN showing the seconds of what was happening before the aircraft had this violent explosion, and appears to have crashed into a wall at the end of the Runway at Muan International Airport. Now, we're still verifying those images, but one of the main things that we're looking at and investigators from here and most certainly the United States since this is a Boeing aircraft we'll be looking at, is what was going on with the landing gear.

Landing gear, Jessica, does not appear from these early images we're looking at to have been deployed. And just from speaking to my buddy, Pete Muntean, our Chief Aviation Correspondent, he's traveling at the moment. But his first take is that that would be extremely, extremely rare for a commercial airliner with a pretty strong safety record like Jeju Air to not have their landing gear deployed. We've also been able to confirm in the past couple minutes it looks like there are two Thai nationals on board.

In terms of the number of any other South Korean passengers, passengers from the rest of the world, that is still outstanding at the moment. It looks like it was a five-hour flight. And from the data that we've been able to obtain from open source Intelligence from FlightAware, from flight tracking, it seems as though this flight that took off just after 2 a.m. local time from Bangkok had no problems, nothing out of the ordinary until the very end of the flight when it touched down, again, about three and a half hours south of Seoul, South Korea, the capital of South Korea. And of course, by touchdown, we mean that extremely violent landing where it appears as though the gear was not deployed, the landing gear was not deployed.

[21:20:00]

The plane and images that we are looking at and working to verify seems as though the plane is just skidding on its belly on the Runway and then careening into this wall leading to the pictures that we're looking at right now, Jessica.

DEAN: Yeah, it is really incredible when you see that video as you're mentioning again, that we're working to verify. But it does appear as if there is no landing gear down, like it is just skidding down that Runway. You mentioned the two survivors, which as you watch this video is really something to -- it's just like shocking that anyone can --

VALERIO: it's unbelievable.

DEAN: -- survive that.

VALERIO: Unbelievable.

DEAN: And what do you know about what they're trying to do to get any additional survivors out because that is clearly a very fiery scene?

VALERIO: It's such a dangerous situation. So they're trying to make sure that they don't put rescuers in harm's way. I mean, it was such a cataclysmic explosion. So they're going to attack it from a distance and then move in closer and closer as it's safer to do so. So just checking the time right here, this happened just about two hours ago. So they have managed to surround this terrible accident scene for almost two hours now, I would say approximately two hours. But it will be nothing short of a miracle if more than two people are found from this wreckage.

And of course, you know, the greater context from all of our viewers who are watching us in the United States and around the world, this country has been put through so much over the couple days and weeks with three leaders in charge of the country. Martial law happening a few days ago in the beginning of the month. And now, to see a sight like this, there is the hope throughout all corners of this country that rescuers will do the best they can and perhaps pull off a miracle here as we are holding our breaths for this death toll to rise, Jessica?

DEAN: Yeah. No doubt about that. South Korea, certainly you give great context around that. Just been through so much in the last several weeks. The nation as a whole has been through a lot. Okay. So again, just recapping for anyone that's checking in with us right now, we are covering breaking news of a plane that has crashed at the Seoul airport there. I'm sorry, at the airport in South Korea where we know that two people have been pulled from that wreckage. We know there was something going on with that landing gear. At least 28 people are dead, 181 on board at the time of the crash. We're going to continue to follow this breaking news and bring you any more developments as we get them.