Investigators are in South Korea searching through plane crash debris to try to determine what caused the country's deadliest air disaster in decades, which killed 179.

CEO Kim Yi-bae says the airline will reduce winter traffic by between 10-15%, but stresses this is not an admission that it was running too many planes.

Moments before the crash of Jeju Air flight 2216, a passenger aboard texted a friend that the Boeing 737-800 aircraft had struck a bird.