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At Least 176 Killed In South Korea Plane Crash; 181 on Board; Trump Defends Foreign Worker Visas, Sides with Musk; Georgia's Parliament Swears in Controversial New President; Putin Apologizes, Doesn't Take Responsibility for Jet Crash; IDF: At Least 240 People Detained in Gaza Hospital Raid. Aired 5-6 am ET

Aired December 29, 2024 - 05:00   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:00:32]

BEN HUNTE, CNN ANCHOR: Hello and welcome to our viewers in the United States, here in the U.K. and all around the world. I'm Ben Hunte and this is CNN Newsroom.

We're obviously beginning with the rising death toll from a horrific plane crash in Muan, South Korea. At least 176 people are dead. 181 passengers and crew were on board the Jeju Air Boeing 737-800. Two people have been rescued. Three people are unaccounted for and officials say they're presumed dead.

Meanwhile, victims' family members have gathered at the airport, hoping to find out more about their loved ones and the crash. Officials say they've recovered the plane's flight data and cockpit voice recorders, but they say it could take years to complete their investigation.

CNN Correspondent Mike Valerio is following all of this breaking news from Seoul for us. Mike, thank you for joining me. This is horrible news and at a time when so many families will be celebrating holidays, being excited for what's coming up. For anyone just waking up now, just tuning in, what is the latest, please?

MIKE VALERIO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Sure. Well, Ben, this is a Jeju Air Boeing 737-800 that was leaving Bangkok, Thailand just after 2 a.m. local time, pushed away from the gate to 11 in Bangkok, due here in South Korea in the 9 a.m. hour. So as you mentioned, the context here, Ben, this is an airline that takes a whole multitude of people to and from idyllic vacation destinations throughout Southeast and Eastern Asia. So we're talking about a whole host of families coming back from Christmas week, getting ready to celebrate the New Year across South Korea.

So they're taking this flight before sunrise, coming in during the 9 a.m. hour, but there for some reason is a warning, according to South Korean officials, that is sent out from the control tower at Muan International Airport to the Jeju airliner. And the control tower says that there is a risk that the flight needs to know about of potential bird strikes and birds flying around the approach to the airport.

Two minutes later, the pilot declares mayday, but for unknown reasons, it could be a potential bird strike, could be something else. We don't know. We just know that the mayday is declared around 9 a.m. And then four minutes later, Ben, that's when the airliner crashes.

So, you know, there have been several authorities throughout the day here in South Korea who've mentioned the possibility of a potential bird strike leading to a cascading series of events. But it's unclear, and our aviation experts here at CNN have certainly noted, how a bird strike could lead to this airliner touching down its belly, scraping the pavement of the runway so close to the end of the runway.

Why was the landing gear not deployed? What would a bird strike have to do with that? Why were the flaps of the wings on this aircraft not deployed? Certainly one of the primary elements of slowing the aircraft down, the nose is pointed down rather than pointed up, coming in hot to this runway.

So, as you mentioned, it could take up to two, three years for South Korean authorities to finish their reports, which is, you know, it takes a few years for authorities in the United States, Europe, most of Asia, the rest of the world, to finish their reports.

But because, Ben, of everything that South Korea has been experiencing, from martial law declared in the late hours of December 3rd to the early morning hours of December 4th, we're on our third person in charge holding presidential powers after President Yoon was impeached, then the acting president impeached. Now we're on our third person with acting presidential powers. There is a pall that's been cast over South Korea, with this catastrophe leading so many to be so angry of just what has been happening across the country over the past few days and weeks.

So there certainly will be mounting pressure for authorities here in South Korea to figure out just what went wrong, what caused the landing gear to fail, to have any connection to any possible bird strike, Ben.

HUNTE: -- for plane incidents. But in both of these situations, you've got survivors. And in the one earlier this week, it seemed that people survived if they were in the tail of the plane. And earlier, we spoke about this. You said that the two crew members that survived this incident were also in the tail of the plane. What more do we know about them and how they survived this?

[05:05:11]

VALERIO: Well, we know that they are -- one of those survivors has already been transferred to a hospital here in Seoul. The second survivor is going to be on her way to the Korean capital shortly. So I would love to be able to answer your question, how in the world they survived. I think that's what all of us are asking here across the country.

As soon as we saw that video of the explosion, the plume seen from miles and kilometers away, we just thought, oh my God, like what -- how could anybody survive that? So there was hope, Ben, as most of the rest of the world was asleep, that there could be some miracle.

First responders expressed optimism that, OK, we've seen this cataclysmic event, but two people have survived. Perhaps more people could survive as well. But I'll tell you, Ben, that hope faded extremely quickly. We're eager to know what exactly the two survivors are able to tell investigators and reveal about what happened.

We don't know the conditions that they're in at the moment, obviously so fragile to have gone through what they did, but it will be key to learn what they are able to describe in the last moments that this flight was in the air and it came crashing down, Ben.

HUNTE: Yes, indeed. Well, so many details have been released over the past few hours, and I'm sure more are on the way. Thank you for reporting, Mike Valerio in Seoul. I'll be speaking to you again very soon.

I want to stay on this story, so let's bring in Geoffrey Thomas, Editor of Airline News. He joins us live from Perth, Australia.

Thank you so much for joining me. How are you doing?

Geoffrey Thomas, : Well, Ben, well.

HUNTE: Good. There are a few things I don't understand about this horrible accident, and hopefully you can break things down for me. The first, if the landing gear isn't down and the plane is getting ready to land, surely there would be alarms or warnings or something in the cockpit telling the pilots not to attempt to land, right?

GEOFFREY THOMAS, EDITOR, AIRLINE NEWS: Look, indeed, if the undercarriage is not deployed, the ground proximity warning system, for instance, which is built into all these aircraft, gives you a multiple series of alarms. Also, there's warning lights as well to tell you the undercarriage is not down. But what we're hearing now, though, is that the air traffic control data from the aircraft, called the ADS-B, this is the data which the aircraft sends out telling the air traffic control its altitude, speed, direction, et cetera. That's how they track aircraft. Typically, that's on all the time, from pushback to arrival at the gate.

On this aircraft, it stopped at 900 feet. And it stopped just after the bird strike that the aircraft suffered. Also, ground observers are saying that there were three explosions related to a bird strike. Because there was a warning of birds in the area.

One minute later, the flight crew declared an emergency. That was at 8.58. And then the air traffic control directed them to approach the airport from another direction. They did that from the north to the south. And the air traffic control data from the plane failed.

Now, what that tells us is that these crew might have been dealing with multiple electrical failures as a result of the bird strike. They might have lost not just one engine, but possibly two engines. So, with this cascading series of problems, they may have had no choice but simply to land without the undercarriage because they just didn't have time to crank it down. This is observations from several different folks on the ground and also aviation experts as well that we have spoken to. So, it appears as though these crew members were suffering or dealing with multiple problems which has led to this terrible, terrible crash.

HUNTE: So, tell me more on that because the next question I wanted to ask you is how the bird strikes hitting the engines and the wings could then affect the wheels not coming down. But if that's the case, what would they have been dealing with that prevented them from just not landing? Couldn't they have just stayed in the air? Break that down for me.

THOMAS: Well, if -- we know from photographs that are appearing that at least the right engine had suffered a significant bird strike, we assume that it failed. The crew declared a mayday, which means they were in serious trouble. Typically, with a single bird strike, a single engine goes out, you wouldn't necessarily declare a mayday.

[05:10:18]

They declared a mayday, which indicates possible multiple bird strikes, which is confirmed by the ground. Therefore, there could be multiple electrical failures because the engines -- both engines have failed. Electrical power is failing.

So, this is -- this is where we're getting cascading series of problems which led the crew to force the crew into a landing without deploying the undercarriage.

HUNTE: I want to just talk a bit about the actual airline. So, Jeju Air's website has been updated to reflect the situation today. There's now this public apology. It's been stripped back to black and white. How does something like this affect the actual airline? Is it going to be the fact that people will be cancelling tickets? Will they boycott flying with them? What's going on now?

THOMAS: Oh, look, definitely, this will impact Jeju Air. I mean, look, over the years, serious air crashes have, in fact, sent some airlines into bankruptcy. There can be a tremendous loss of confidence, particularly with all the horrific vision that we are seeing.

Obviously, people will want to know the reason why this aircraft crashed, more detail. Was it, you know, crew incompetence? Was it factors beyond the crew's control?

Look, there are a series of factors that would impact the airline in the long term. In the short term, yes, there will be a series of cancellations, multiple cancellations, and this could knock the airline around rather badly. Although, the airline's been in business for almost 20 years with no fatalities. This is their first fatal crash, I understand. So, yes, it's going to be pretty tough time for them for quite a few months. HUNTE: Yes, indeed. I was actually living in Malaysia when the Malaysia Airlines incidents were happening, and there was definitely a push back then.

Geoffrey Thomas in Perth, Australia, thank you so much for joining me. I appreciate it.

THOMAS: No problem.

HUNTE: In Canada, part of a plane caught fire on a runway in Nova Scotia. The fire broke out after an Air Canada commuter flight experienced a problem while landing, skidding down the runway at Halifax Airport on Saturday. As smoke and flames consumed the left side of the plane, passengers and crew were evacuated within just a few minutes, then taken to a hangar where they were checked out by paramedics.

The incident closed the airport temporarily, and it has been reopened since then. And in the U.S., the threat of severe weather continues to loom large for millions of Americans. At least two people are dead after severe storms and tornadoes tore through parts of Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi on Saturday. New tornado watches have been posted across parts of Florida, Alabama and Georgia.

Almost 10 million Americans are currently under tornado watches. More than 2 million were under a rare particularly dangerous situation warning earlier on Saturday, according to the U.S. National Weather Service.

A number of tornadoes were reported outside of Houston, Texas on Saturday, including in the small town of Montgomery, where you can see here a family including young children had to be rescued from the rubble.

There were some 30 reports of tornadoes on Saturday from Texas to Alabama. The threat area continues to move eastwards in the hours ahead.

After the break, Donald Trump finally wades into the MAGA versus Elon Musk showdown. We'll have more on whose side he took next.

And in Tbilisi, Georgia's parliament has sworn in a new president in defiance of widespread protests. That story when we come back.

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[05:17:57]

HUNTE: An update on this hour's breaking news. The death toll from a plane crash in Muan, South Korea is now 176. 181 people were on a Jeju Air flight from Bangkok. Two crew members have been rescued.

Officials say the three people unaccounted for are now presumed dead. Investigators have recovered the flight data and the voice recorders from the wreckage. Donald Trump is finally taking sides in the civil war brewing among his supporters when it comes to a particular immigration issue. CNN's Alayna Treene has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ALAYNA TREENE, CNN POLITICAL REPORTER: Well, President-elect Donald Trump on Saturday defended the H-1B visa program, essentially, which allows high-skilled foreign workers to come and work in the United States, weighing in for the first time on an issue that has really divided his supporters this week.

I want to read for you what he told the "New York Post" in a phone interview on Saturday. He said, quote, "I've always liked the visas. I have always been in favor of the visas. That's why we have them."

He added, "I have many H-1B visas on my properties. I've been a believer in H-1B. I've used it many times. It's a great program."

Now, to take a step back here, this is a conversation that has really kind of shown a rift among his supporters this week. On one hand, you have kind of the MAGA faithful, the people who have been very loyal to Donald Trump and many of whom have been attracted to him because of his hardline immigration views. Then, on the other hand, you have a lot of the Silicon Valley latecomers to this, people who have supported Donald Trump but also really rely on these high-skilled foreign workers for their own businesses.

Now, all of this kind of started playing out when we saw Elon Musk, a close confidant of Donald Trump and also someone who is going to be running his new Department of Government Efficiency Initiative, started weighing in on it, on X this week, really defending the H-1B visa program. We also saw Vivek Ramaswamy, who's going to be running that initiative with him, defend that program as well.

Now, to be clear, Donald Trump has been ambiguous on this issue in the past. I remind you that back during his first administration, we actually saw H-1B visas -- excuse me, H-1B visas decline significantly during his first term, and at one point his administration had even suspended them altogether.

[05:20:09]

However, earlier this year, Donald Trump told a popular podcast that he actually believed that any immigrant who came to this country and graduated from a United States university should receive a green card and be allowed to stay in the country. All to say, Donald Trump is now saying that he supports this program, but it's unclear exactly what this will mean for policies come his next administration.

Now, one thing as well I want to note is, going back to Elon Musk's support of this program, he weighed in again on Friday, something that drew a lot of ire from far-right pundits like Laura Loomer and Ann Coulter. I'm going to read for you what he said. Musk said, quote, "The reason I'm in America, along with so many critical people who built SpaceX, Tesla, and hundreds of other companies that made America strong, is because of H-1B." He added, "I will go to war on this issue, the likes of which you cannot possibly comprehend."

So, as of now, it does seem that Donald Trump and Elon Musk are aligned on this issue, despite a lot of the backlash we've seen Musk and others who have supported this program receive this week. Alayna Treene, CNN, West Palm Beach, Florida.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HUNTE: The Trump administration is, of course, preparing for an aggressive immigration crackdown when it returns to power. But migrants are already facing hardship before they even get to the U.S. Karol Suarez has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KAROL SUAREZ, JOURNALIST (voice-over): Edward (ph) is a barber with an American dream. He left Venezuela a decade ago and is now in Mexico City.

EDWARD (ph) (through translator): I'm heading to the border. Since I got here, it's been eight months, and I tried three times.

SUAREZ (voice-over): Mexico is a country of origin, transit, and destination for migration flows in the region. Nearly a million migrants have entered Mexico illegally this year, including people from Sri Lanka, India, Colombia, Guatemala and Ecuador, among other countries.

(On camera): In this makeshift camp, migrants rest and apply daily for U.S. asylum appointments. One migrant told us he's been here over a year without success. He calls the uncertain wait here the hardest part of his journey.

(Voice-over): Some of those in limbo are unhappy with how they are treated.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): The worst thing in the world. We feel terrible because we're discriminated against, and the children can't go to school because they're bullied. The worst of the seven countries we've traveled through is Mexico. The worst.

SUAREZ (voice-over): Authorities told CNN that migrant complaints of alleged abuse by officials rarely make it to the prosecutor's office. Meanwhile, others have learned to cope with the situation.

EDWARD (through translator): We feel OK. We already know about the xenophobia and everything happening here. We just have to have faith in God.

SUAREZ (voice-over): However, they say the frustration they feel is hard to keep to themselves.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (through translator): If human rights were respected, as they say, they would give us a permit like they did with the caravan. But they don't do it.

SUAREZ (voice-over): For some, the road north stops here.

JESUS (ph) (through translator): I have had enough, and I'm going back to Venezuela. I have decided to stop wasting time.

SUAREZ: Jesus (ph) says he wants to forget the experience of being a migrant, but he admits he did not achieve his goals. And now it's time to reunite with his family.

Karol Suarez, Mexico City.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HUNTE: Images of Joe Biden meeting his son's Chinese business partners and Hunter Biden meeting the Chinese President and other officials have been made public for the first time. It appears these encounters happened during an official visit to China in 2013, when Biden was vice president. This undercuts Joe Biden's assertions that he never had any business-related contact with his son.

The National Archives released the images following a request from a pro-Trump legal group. Hunter Biden's attorney is criticizing the group. He says this is nothing new.

In Tbilisi, Georgia's parliament has sworn in Mikheil Kavelashvili, the man they appointed to take over the presidency.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (Speaking in Foreign Language).

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNTE: The directly elected former president spoke to supporters who oppose what the ruling Georgia Dream Party is doing. She calls it an anti-constitutional farce. Protests have taken place for weeks against the ruling party's shift. Towards Russia and away from a path to joining the European Union. They've met with violent repression by the government.

In the lead up to the swearing-in ceremony, people throughout the country formed a human chain in solidarity and opposition. The former president and opposition parties vowed to fight on for their cause.

Ia Meurmishvili, Chief International Correspondent for the Cipher Brief, joined me earlier from Tbilisi, and I asked her where Georgia goes from here with that deep divide between the ruling party on the one hand and the opposition and protesters on the other.

[05:25:13]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

IA MEURMISHVILI, CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT, CIPHER BRIEF: Today was a very good demonstration of how Georgia has been living in this dual or parallel reality created on the one hand by the Georgian dream government and on the other hand by those demonstrators that you just referred to.

Today -- in today's speech, Salome Zourabichvili did not say that she will, she's leaving per se. She said that she will take legitimacy of her office or she will take legitimacy wherever she goes. She will carry the flag of Georgia wherever she goes.

So, in one sense, at least to me, that statement sounded, it was not a definite I'm leaving sort of statement. But the decision that you made is definitely saving the country from repeating some of the scenarios that we know in Belarus, for example, or Venezuela, where after the contested elections, a country would have two recognized and unrecognized presidencies.

So we'll see how this continues. President Zourabichvili also pledged that she will get more actively involved in the effort to get the country ready, including the opposition as well as the cities and towns in Georgia for the new elections, which is the primary demand that she had from the Georgian dream government.

And that's also something that the demonstrators are demanding release of all the prisoners that Georgian dream has arrested over 500 people in the past month and call for new elections.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNTE: There is still so much more ahead on CNN. When we return, the latest on the breaking news we've been following all morning that deadly plane crash in South Korea.

Plus, new details on the Azerbaijan Airlines crash as Vladimir Putin calls the country's president to apologize.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:30:27]

HUNTE: Welcome back to our viewers in the United States, in the UK and all around the world. I'm Ben Hunte and this is CNN Newsroom.

Officials say they've recovered the cockpit voice recorder from the Jeju Air plane crash in Muan, South Korea. Earlier they found the plane's flight data recorder. They also now say the death toll is 176. 181 people were on board the Boeing 737-800.

Two crew members were pulled from the wreckage alive. And officials say the three people unaccounted for are now presumed dead. Officials say the crew made a mayday call two minutes before trying to land.

CNN Correspondent Mike Valerio is still following this breaking news for us from Seoul.

Thanks for being with me again, Mike. I just want to make sure we're airing the very latest that we're getting. So what is happening now?

VALERIO: Well, you are. And you know, Ben, I just want to point out that the pictures that we were seeing of the crash scene floodlit, those are live pictures. And there is an all-out effort to try to find the presumed remains of the three people who have not been accounted for yet.

And there are, if you can imagine, just scores of families who are gathered in a pretty small conference area of the international airport about three and a half hours south of Seoul, where we're broadcasting from right now, who are waiting to see if those firefighters right there under the floodlights are going to be successful in finding their three loved ones who are the last to be found and identified in this calamity that has cast a pall over South Korea.

So the main questions, in case you're just waking up with us and are waking up to this news, that we certainly have been asking all day throughout Southeast and Eastern Asia is what exactly happened to cause the landing gear to fail? We have all of these dramatic videos and pictures that have come in where you see a plane trying to land, coming in relatively fast, coming in towards the very tail end of this runway of Muan International Airport.

And without the flaps of the wings deployed, which certainly one of the primary elements of slowing down a plane, we have the added aspects of the storyline here with numerous emergency officials saying that a bird strike could have happened and perhaps could have contributed to a chain of events that led to this catastrophe.

So, as you mentioned, Ben, in the intro to the segment, this is just before 9 a.m. local time here in South Korea. Two minutes -- or I should say, two minutes before the first mayday is sent from the cockpit of this aircraft, there's a warning that's received for the control tower that says, paraphrasing here, hey, there are birds near the runway, near the approach to the airport. Try a different approach and certainly watch out.

So then we have two minutes later, the mayday called. Four minutes after that, the plane crashes. But what all of the experts and certainly members of government and first responders are trying to figure out is, would a bird strike lead to the chain of events that perhaps could impact the landing gear?

And right now, that is certainly puzzling. So many analysts and emergency officials on both sides of the Pacific Ocean and from all of the experts we talked to, you know, throughout the realm of context that CNN has access to. So, again, the gleam of hope here is coming from the two people who survived this crash miraculously.

They were seated in the back of the aircraft in the tail portion, the only part of the 737-800 that sort of looks as it did. Everything else is unrecognizable. There are two crew members, a man and a woman, and one of them is en route to a trauma one center here in Seoul. The man is already here in Seoul.

So the hope, Ben, again, you know, just in closing, is that they both can help gleam what happened here with the voice and data recorders. Just such an unbelievable chain of events, Ben. HUNTE: It's horrible. The fact that we've even seen that video of the plane going down the runway, it's mad. The fact we've even got all of this, these videos and this content, those live pictures there.

Mike, thank you for reporting over the past few hours and to your team in South Korea as well. I really appreciate that.

VALERIO: Thanks, Ben.

HUNTE: With both black boxes now recovered from the crashed airline and a question of what caused the crash will hopefully be answered sooner rather than later.

[05:35:04]

But as CNN Safety Analyst, David Soucie, puts it, an investigation may reveal that more could have been done on the ground to mitigate this disaster.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAVID SOUCIE, CNN SAFETY ANALYST: My concern is that after it touches down, that there are blockades and items on near the runway that they collided with that may have caused this severe explosion once it hit the ground. So a well-designed airport would not have had any kind of blockades there.

The aircraft could have landed and slide off the runway onto the grass, and it should not have been able to, it should not have had any interference with these blockades. So that would be the first thing, as an investigator, I would be looking at is certainly this tragic loss of life perhaps could have been avoided had the airport been designed and prepared for this type of emergency landing.

If a pilot knows that they're going to have to land an emergency situation without the landing gear, they radio ahead to the airport and the airport can do some things to prepare for that. They can put foam on the runway. They can have emergency vehicles standing by so that when the aircraft does have this emergency landing.

So it appears to me that no one was really aware of the fact, at least on the ground, that the aircraft was landing without the landing gear down. So that indicates to me that possibly it was an oversight during the emergency landing to not deploy the landing gear. That's one of the things that I would be looking at, again, as an investigator.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HUNTE: Russian President Vladimir Putin has apologized for the fact that an Azerbaijan Airlines flight crashed after entering Russian airspace on Christmas Day. During a phone call with Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev, Putin called it a tragic incident. Aliyev told Putin that external interference led to a complete loss of control before the plane went down in Kazakhstan, killing 38 people.

CNN's Nada Bashir is following the latest developments for us. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NADA BASHIR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, as questions continue to mount over the possible connection between Russian air defense systems and Wednesday's deadly plane crash, Russian President Vladimir Putin has issued an apology for the fact that the flight crashed after entering Russian airspace around the Chechen city of Grozny, acknowledging, according to the Kremlin, that Russia's air defense systems were in fact active when the plane attempted to land in Grozny.

However, no admission of responsibility from Moscow. Investigations are still ongoing, but nearby Ukrainian drone attacks in the moments preceding the crash have led some officials to believe that the plane may have been downed mistakenly by Russian anti-aircraft defenses, with officials in Azerbaijan saying that the plane came under external physical and technical interferences while in Russian airspace.

Meanwhile, several aviation experts and U.S. officials have said that perforations seen in the fuselage are consistent with shrapnel damage from an explosion, but the cause of the holes in the wreckage has not yet been confirmed. Investigators are continuing to assess the evidence, including two black box recorders which were recovered from the wreckage, as well as, of course, eyewitness accounts.

Remarkably, 29 people out of 67 on board the flight survived the crash, some of whom filmed their final moments on the flight, one survivor describing a loud bang being heard and felt before the plane began to descend. But it could still be a matter of days or even weeks before any final conclusions are made by investigators.

For now, at least five airlines have suspended flights to areas in Russia, many citing safety concerns.

Nada Bashir, CNN, London.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HUNTE: An investigation is now underway in Florida after a train collided with a fire truck on Saturday.

Let's have a look at the footage. You can see from this, from the train itself, it's moving along on the tracks, heading towards a fire engine that appears to be slowly moving through a traffic crossing. There it is there. Gosh. Will stop the footage just before the moment of impact.

Officials say three firefighters were transported to a nearby hospital. Twelve passengers sustained minor injuries, but no fatalities were reported. This isn't the first incident involving the train operator Brightline, which provides passenger rail service between Orlando and Miami.

The Federal Railroad Administration says 34 people were killed in incidents involving Brightline trains between September 2023 and June of this year. Next, there are no major working hospitals left in northern Gaza after

Israeli troops raided the last remaining one. Still ahead, eyewitness accounts about what happened at the facility during the Israeli military operation.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[05:42:51]

HUNTE: I want to bring you some more now on a breaking news in South Korea. Officials say they've located both the flight data and voice recorders, or black boxes, from the plane crash in the city of Muan. But they say the investigation into the cause of the crash may still take years.

177 people are now confirmed dead. 181 people were on board the Boeing 737-800. Two of them have been rescued. And firefighters say the two unaccounted for are now presumed dead.

We're also learning that the plane's pilot made a mayday call after air traffic control warned that birds were in the area and a strike was possible.

The relatives of hostages held in Gaza have made a new appeal for them to be returned home. On Saturday night, they lit Hanukkah candles and called for their release after almost 450 days in captivity. The ceremony in Tel Aviv was led by the son of one of the hostages.

But in Jerusalem, you're hearing emergency sirens ringing out there after two projectiles were fired on the city from northern Gaza. Israeli officials say there were no reports of injuries. And the military fired interceptors after the projectiles crossed over the border.

The last major functioning health facility in northern Gaza now sits empty and partially burned out. That's according to the World Health Organization and witnesses following Israel's latest raid on a Kamal Adwan Hospital. The IDF says at least 240 people have been detained for questioning, claiming they're Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists. Some patients and staff have been transferred to another hospital, which the WHO described as destroyed and non-functional.

Witnesses say some of them were told to strip their clothes and were beaten by Israeli troops. The IDF says it operated in accordance with international law.

Let's dig into this and get more on this. We are joined by Dr. Mimi Syed, an Emergency Medicine Physician from the U.S. She's speaking with us from al-Aqsa Hospital, which is located in central Gaza.

[05:45:02]

Firstly, it is incredible to have you with us. We appreciate you. We appreciate the work that you're doing. This is all just so, so heavy.

I guess my first question is, how are you feeling? How are you doing? DR. MIMI SYED, EMERGENCY MEDICINE PHYSICIAN: I'm overwhelmed. The situation here -- this is my second mission here in Gaza. I was here in August, and I never thought that this would be possible for it to get worse, and it is significantly worse. We're still seeing the same type of injuries, but we're also seeing, like, the sequelae of the aggression taking place. Malnourishment is sky high in babies. We have four cases of hypothermia in babies that have died overnight in a tent.

Situation is terrible. Now we learn about Kamal Adwan Hospital. The director has been arrested and abducted. Patients have been forced out and are not going to be receiving medical care. There is no place for them to go. Even the hospitals here where I'm at, it's completely overburdened and under-resourced.

We're barely able to provide the care for these patients. And then they go back, even if they can, they go back to terrible living conditions.

HUNTE: I mean, this is the latest incident where the IDF removes healthcare workers and patients from their work. Surely, that is having a massive impact on your daily operations and what you're seeing, even in terms of being able to just plan ahead. What can you tell us about that impact?

SYED: Sir, you broke up there, Ben.

HUNTE: What can you tell us about the impact that them pausing the work is having on you?

SYED: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, this is -- this is going to cause an influx of patients into the central, where I am, central Gaza, as well as I know that some patients have been received in Nasser and European as well. Those hospitals are in the same situation as us, you know, completely overburdened in an already broken healthcare system.

I can't imagine the deaths that are going to be taking place. It's just going to continue. You know, another thing to mention is the water contamination is so terrible. E.coli is over 50% in the water here. And children are getting so sick and coming in with severe dehydration and renal failure, things that are completely preventable and unnecessary. We could completely fix this, you know, if we just let aid in. And, you know, some fire.

HUNTE: We're actually seeing -- we're going to see some of your social media clips and pics while chatting now. Even from what we've reported to CNN, it all looks absolutely horrific. I mean, some of the incidents that we're seeing.

This must be such a wild time to be a medical professional in Gaza. You said earlier, this is your second mission. I mean, what is motivating you to be there? What's that experience like? What does this second mission feel like compared to the first?

SYED: You know, people ask me that a lot. What compels you to come back? And first and foremost, I'm a mother. And having these children have these atrocious acts against them, I cannot turn the other way. Second, I'm a physician. I'm a humanitarian worker. And as physicians and healthcare workers, we are protectors of humanity. Humanity is completely being violated here and ended here. This can't go on. It just simply cannot go on.

HUNTE: CNN reporting from Gaza shows that people are obviously really struggling. They're facing malnutrition, disease. They're displaced from their homes. What are you most concerned about in the months ahead?

SYED: You know, the temperatures have dropped. I know people, you know, I've said on social media, well, it's not freezing temperatures. Well, if you have a newborn baby out for 24/7 in cold temperatures like 50 degrees Fahrenheit, that's a recipe for hypothermia.

They're not able to maintain insulation. These tents, they're made out of scraps. And they're not actual tents. You know, they're not made out of building material. And so, you know, allowing insulation inside those buildings, it's just not possible. And we have so many patients we're seeing of hypothermia, not to mention the malnutrition that they have on top of it, making everything just tenfold.

So I'm just worried. And I'm seeing it every day. But I'm seeing the situation just spiral. And this is -- it's getting out of control. I mean, it just -- it's easy to stop. It's completely unnecessary. The diseases that we're seeing are preventable.

HUNTE: Well, Dr. Mimi Syed in Gaza, thank you for your time. Thank you for your work. We appreciate it. Please stay safe. Please do.

SYED: Thank you.

HUNTE: Israel's Prime Minister is set to undergo surgery to remove his prostate in the coming hours. His office says Benjamin Netanyahu had a medical exam on Wednesday when doctors discovered a urinary tract infection caused by a benign enlarged prostate. The infection has already been treated with antibiotics.

Israel's government is still set to hold its meeting planned for Sunday. CNN has reached out to Mr. Netanyahu's office to find out who will fill in as interim leader during the procedure. The Prime Minister is 75 years old.

[05:50:09]

There's still much more to come on CNN. We'll tell you about NASA's latest success, a historic mission that brought humanity closer to the sun than ever before. Stay with us.

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HUNTE: An update now on our top story. Investigators have recovered the flight data and the voice recorder from the wreckage of the crashed plane in South Korea. In the past few minutes, the death toll has officially risen to 177 people. Two crew members have been rescued. Officials say the two people unaccounted for are presumed dead.

Meanwhile, victims' family members have gathered at the airport, hoping to find out more about their loved ones and the crash.

On Tuesday, NASA's Parker Solar Probe made a record-breaking flyby. The craft passed less than four million miles from the sun. It was humanity's closest ever approach to the star that lights our planet.

Our Paula Newton has more on the story.

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PAULA NEWTON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Here comes the sun. NASA is ending the year on a high. Its Parker Solar Probe flying closer to the sun than any space mission has ever done.

[05:55:10]

On Christmas Eve, the probe flew through the sun's outer atmosphere called the corona in a record-breaking flyby coming within 6.1 million kilometers of the sun's surface, and withstanding expected temperatures of up to 982 degrees Celsius. And after a nail-biting few days when it was out of contact with NASA, it phoned home.

JOE WESTLAKE, NASA HELIOPHYSICS DIRECTOR: You know, we got this green beacon back. The green beacon is basically, hey, I'm here, I'm OK, everything looks all right. I'll be sending you back the data soon. As Parker gets farther and farther away from the sun, it gets much easier to actually transmit the data.

NEWTON: Scientists expect to hear again from the probe on January 1st, when they'll be able to check out how much data it collected, which could shed light on some of the sun's mysteries, like what makes the corona so hot and what drives solar winds. The spacecraft is expected to make more passes of the sun in 2025, something NASA says could help humans to better understand the shining star that powers life on Earth.

WESTLAKE: I mean, it's amazing, right, to know that you can actually achieve high, you know, if you think about it, like, we humans have created a spacecraft. That spacecraft has gone into the atmosphere of the sun. Like, that's just a huge technological achievement and a huge scientific achievement for us at NASA.

Paula Newton, CNN.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HUNTE: Well, that's it. That's all I've got for you for this hour of CNN Newsroom. And yes, it has been heavy.

I'm Ben Hunte in London. Let's do it all again next weekend. Our coverage of the deadly plane crash in South Korea continues in just a few minutes with "CNN This Morning." See you later.

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