The San Francisco Chronicle
SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. — The San Francisco Fire Department supervisors who took charge of the Asiana Airlines Flight 214 crash scene were not alerted by firefighters that a 16-year-old passenger had been found near the plane, leaving them powerless to prevent the girl from being run over by a rig after she was covered by fire-retardant foam, footage of the incident shows.
The footage was recorded by a camera mounted on the helmet of a battalion chief who took charge of the firefighting and rescue response within an hour after the Boeing 777 crashed at San Francisco International Airport on July 6.
The footage reveals what Battalion Chief Mark Johnson did and was told at the scene. It also shows in graphic detail the events that ended with crash survivor Ye Meng Yuan being crushed by a foam-spraying rig.
 |
| Photo San Francisco Fire Department |
One mystery arises from the footage: Johnson arrived not long after firefighters found Ye and mistakenly concluded she was dead, according to what the firefighters have told investigators — but there is no evidence Johnson was ever informed of the discovery.
Probe of girl’s death
Johnson has turned over the footage to investigators from the fire and police departments and the National Transportation Safety Board, who are probing how the girl was put in harm’s way, mistaken for dead and run over. The Chronicle reviewed a copy of the footage supplied by a source, who stipulated that it not be posted online because of the investigation.
The footage picks up as Johnson, who oversees firehouses in the Bayview-Hunters Point area, arrived at a staging area several hundred feet from the burning plane. He and Assistant Fire Chief Tom Siragusa were briefed by fire Capt. Anthony Robinson, who coordinated the initial emergency response.
“All of the passengers are off the plane,” Robinson told the two. “They just completed a secondary search. There are no passengers on the plane.”
Siragusa then put Johnson in command of the firefighting and rescue effort, and the battalion chief started walking toward the wreckage. Johnson looked toward the area in front of the left wing where Ye was found, but only foam was visible.
 |
| Photo San Francisco Fire Department |
Crucial moment
As Johnson walked toward the back of the jet, the footage shows, a foam-spraying rig called Rescue 10 was in the distance, driving away from the area where Ye was discovered.
It was a crucial moment in the events leading to the Chinese schoolgirl’s death.
The two firefighters aboard Rescue 10, Roger Phillips and Jimmy Yee, have told investigators they spotted Ye in the fetal position on the ground just before they drove off, according to Fire Department sources and others involved in the probe.
Fire Lt. Christine Emmons and at least one other firefighter looked at the girl and concluded she was dead, said the sources, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the probe publicly.
According to the San Mateo County coroner, however, Ye was alive for several more minutes, until a second rig ran over her. It is not clear how Emmons or the other firefighter, who has not been identified, decided she was dead.
No one told him
Phillips and Yee have told investigators they steered their rig around the girl after pointing her out to fire supervisors. By the time Johnson’s helmet camera recorded their rig leaving the scene, Ye would have been found, a discovery that should have been communicated to the battalion chief whether she was alive or dead.
 |
| Photo San Francisco Fire Department |
However, Robinson said nothing to Johnson about either a survivor or a body being located, and the audio from Johnson’s helmet-camera footage shows no such discovery was communicated to him in the minutes that followed.
Emmons has declined to comment since a news conference two days after the crash, at which she described her rescue efforts. Attempts to reach Phillips and Yee have been unsuccessful.
Johnson said Friday he could not comment without the approval of Fire Department superiors. Chief Joanne Hayes-White, who has called Ye’s death “a tragic accident,” did not respond to phone calls.
Foam builds up
When Johnson reached a spot about 25 feet from the back of the plane, he came upon an engine spraying foam on the jet and told the driver to redirect his aim. The footage shows that for a few seconds, the foam arced into the area in front of the left wing where, according to the Rescue 10 firefighters, Ye had already been found.
By this time, foam sprayed by other rigs elsewhere around the plane was building up by the wing, the footage shows.
Seeing smoke billowing from the front of the plane, Johnson radioed for a rig to move to the spot Rescue 10 had vacated.
“We’re going to need somebody with foam here,” he said. “We need to get the fire right in front of the fuselage.”
Rescue 37, a foam-spraying rig operated by a lone firefighter, pulled up to do just that. Its driver, who had been out buying lunch for colleagues after getting off her shift, returned to the airport fire station to find everyone gone and rushed out to the scene.
Out of foam
She sprayed foam for several minutes on the front of the plane, then told Johnson she was out of foam and had to drive off to get more.
 |
| Photo San Francisco Fire Department |
As she did so, Rescue 37 ran over Ye, who by this time was covered in foam. The rig lacked heat-sensing equipment, installed on other firefighting vehicles at the airport, that could have detected a body obscured by the fire retardant.
Johnson did not immediately realize what had happened, the footage shows, and continued calling for help fighting the fire.
About that time, Emmons and at least one other firefighter told Johnson they wanted to head toward the back of the plane to search for survivors. Emmons had already joined a crew of firefighters and police officers who had taken five people off the jet - it has never been made clear whether Ye was among them, or how she ended up near the left wing.
Johnson asked why they wanted to return, the footage shows. “Anybody who is in there right now, they’re dead,” he said. “They told me everybody’s off. It’s useless to go in there, you guys.”
‘You’ve got a body’
Emmons, however, headed off with other firefighters. About one minute later, another lieutenant approached Johnson and told him, “You’ve got a body over here.”
Johnson looked at the girl, whose crushed body was in the tracks of the rig that had run over her. “My God,” he exclaimed.
Johnson then asked that someone cover the girl. Another firefighter draped a yellow plastic tarp over her.
 |
| Photo San Francisco Fire Department |
The battalion chief soon radioed commanders about having found the body, then oversaw one last effort to check the plane for any passengers or crew.
As firefighters scrambled up a ladder to look in the cockpit, Johnson told others on the ground, “Everybody watch these green things (rigs) — they move around without telling anybody, all right?”
Copyright 2013 The San Francisco Chronicle
All Rights Reserved