- .Footage shows the moments surrounding Ye Meng Yuan's death
- .Chief Mark Johnson arrives on the scene but is apparently not told that a girl has been found near the plane and mistakenly identified as dead
- .A foam rig drives away from the scene and hits the girl, killing her
- .Video, which has not been released, now part of probe into her death
By LYDIA WARREN
Footage taken by a fire chief responding to the Asiana Airlines Flight 214 crash has revealed he was not told a 16-year-old girl was lying injured on the runway - leaving him unable to prevent her from being fatally hit by an emergency vehicle.
Ye Meng Yuan, a student from China, was killed when one of the responding vehicles ran over her after she was covered by fire-retardant foam at the San Fransisco International Airport on July 6.
Video filmed by a camera on the fire chief's helmet has now revealed that, although firefighters had seen her on the runway, the message was not communicated to the chief, Mark Johnson.
It meant that responding vehicles were also not told of her whereabouts, leaving a foam rig to hit her.
Chaos: Footage taken from a fire chief's helmet cam shows foam rigs responding to the scene. By this point, a Chinese schoolgirl had been found on the ground but the chief was apparently not told
Fatal: It is believed that this foam rig fatally hit Ye Mengyuan. At this point, she was lying somewhere in front of the chief after landing by the plane's left wing, but she was covered with foam
Ye's death is under review by investigators from the fire and police departments and the National Transportation Safety Board.
As part of the probe, the footage from Johnson's camera is being reviewed. It was also seen by a reporter at the San Francisco Chronicle, who described what the chief saw.
After the plane apparently landed too slow and hit the sea wall - ripping off the craft's tail and sending the plane smashing into the runway - Ye was ejected and landed by the left wing.
Two San Francisco Fire Department firefighters who responded to the scene in a truck say they spotted her lying in the fetal position on the runway, and two other firefighters concluded that she was dead - although a coroner has since said that she was still alive at this point.
Chaos: This image shows the chief, Mark Johnson, as he responded to the crash scene on July 6
Response: Rigs douse the burning shell with fire-retardant foam, which also covered 16-year-old Ye
Mix up: She had been seen by other firefighters who had mistakenly concluded she was dead; it is not believed her whereabouts were communicated to the battalion chief
It is not clear why the latter two firefighters thought she was dead, the Chronicle reported.
It was at this point that Johnson arrived on the scene and took over control of the scene.
Victim: Ye died from blunt force trauma as a result of being hit by a vehicle, the coroner said
In the footage, the first foam rig - driven by two men who saw her body - is seen driving away from the scene as Johnson arrives and looks over the area where Ye's foam-covered body lies.
But according to the footage, the girl's location was not reported to him; the battalion chief should have been told of the girl's whereabouts, whether or not she was alive or dead.
A second fire rig then arrived on the scene and, after dousing the plane with foam, the driver said she needed to fill up the vehicle again. Unaware there was a victim beneath the foam, the driver pulled off and hit her.
In a tragic twist, the rig, labeled Rescue 37, was not fitted with heat-sensing equipment like other firefighting vehicles at the airport. The equipment would have detected the body beneath the foam, the Chronicle reported.
After Johnson directed the firefighters to leave the scene after hearing everyone was off the plane, another lieutenant approached him and told him there was a body nearby
On the footage, Johnson walks over and looks at the girl's crushed body. 'My God,' he says, before asking for someone to cover her body with a yellow tarp.
Aerial images of the scene taken by the Associated Press later showed the girl's body covered with the tarp. Tire tracks could apparently be seen running up to the body.
Discovery: After a lieutenant spots the girl's body, Johnson asks for it to be covered with a tarp
Investigation: The footage is being used by authorities to probe what went wrong before the girl's death
The San Francisco Chronicle has not shared the footage online after its source asked it not be uploaded while the investigation continues.
It is not known exactly how Ye ended up on the runway near the left wing, but according to the San Mateo County coroner, she was alive for several minutes until she was struck.
The coroner concluded that she died of blunt force trauma as a result of being hit by a vehicle.
None of the officers who feature in the footage have responded to a request for comment, while Johnson said he would need the approval of Fire Department superiors to be able to do so.
Ye's middle school classmate, 16-year-old Wang Linjia, also died in the July 6 crash. The other victim, 15-year-old Liu Yipeng, died from her injuries six days after the crash.
Scene: The yellow tarp is right, by the truck. Tire tracks can apparently be seen near to her body
Beyond recognition: The charred remains of Asiana Airlines Flight 214 after crash landing in San Francisco
Wang was among a group of injured passengers who did not get immediate medical help after the crash; rescuers did not spot her until 14 minutes later.
The victims were top students who were to spend a few weeks at a Christian summer camp in California, where they planned to practice English to boost their chances of attending a U.S. college.
The crash occurred after the airliner collided with a rocky seawall just short the runway. There were 182 survivors taken to hospitals, though most suffered only minor injuries.
An initial investigation indicated that the pilots failed to realize until too late that the aircraft was dangerously low and flying too slow. The investigation continues.
Heartbreak: The fathers of the three crash victims, Liu Yipeng, Wang Linjia and Ye Mengyuan, carry the ashes of their daughters during a memorial in Jiangshan, Zhejiang province on August 1
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