Spinal Fracture is Common Injury in Asiana Crash

Many of the passengers hurt in a weekend plane crash suffered spinal injuries that will require long-term treatment, according to a doctor who tended to them.

“There are some people very, very badly hurt,” Geoff Manley, M.D., vice chairman of neurological surgery at the University of California-San Francisco, told MSNBC News. “There was some blunt force injury from seatbelts and people striking their heads against the seat and armrests. We have a lot of spine trauma.”

That trauma consists mostly of fractured spines and crushed vertebrae—injuries typically associated with vehicular transportation accidents. Some of the worst injuries from the July 6 Asiana Airlines jet crash resulted from passengers being bounced around and flung against their seat belts as the twin-engine 777 clipped a seawall during landing, then jerked along the runway before catching fire in a nearby field. The mishap injured 180 of the 291 passengers, 49 critically, and killed two teenaged girls, San Francisco International Airport officials said.

The injuries range from bruises and minor burns to bone fractures, head trauma and internal lacerations. “Given the nature of the accident, it is remarkable we did not see more significant injuries,” Manley said.

As the wide-body jet hit the ground, passengers most likely were thrust forward, backward, up and down, making them prime candidates for whiplash, Manley noted. “This is whiplash to the nth degree,” he told MSNBC. “People were flipped forward and back as the plane crashed. When you bend forward or backward like that, you can literally crush the vertebrae.”

In some passengers, the spinous process—the piece of bone on the back of the neck—cracked in half. One patient appeared to be paralyzed from the waist down, though Manley believes it still is too early to determine the full extent of that patient’s injuries.

Even passengers with no obvious signs of spinal fractures can become paralyzed due to the inability of stretched ligaments to stabilized the spine. “We have a number of these injuries that are highly unstable,” Manley noted. “We are going to put in screws and rods and things like that and stabilize the spine.”

Two patients in critical condition sustained “road rash,” injuries suggesting they were dragged along the ground, while many patients suffered from crush-type trauma, perhaps from heavy objects (overhead luggage) falling on them.

Most of the severe injuries were limited to adults on board the flight; while children were hurt in the crash (and received treatment), none sustained spinal trauma. “I think kids are typically more flexible,” Manley hypothesized. “They have a lower center of gravity. Little kids are made to rough and tumble. They do weather injuries well.”

The crash is under investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board. No cause has been determined, though federal officials revealed on July 8 that the pilot was still training on the wide-body jet and had never landed a 777 at San Francisco’s airport. The pilot, Lee Kang-Kuk, had logged just 43 hours flying the jet over nine flights—17 hours short of the 60 hours (and 10 flights) required to be fully qualified on the aircraft. The co-pilot had logged more than 3,000 hours flying the jet, Asiana Airlines bigwigs claim.

Asiana Flight 214 originated from Shanghai and stopped in Seoul, South Korea, before arriving in San Francisco. It was the first fatal crash in the 18 years the 777 has been in service.