SAN FRANCISCO (CN) - The parents of a teenager who was run over and killed by emergency vehicles in the confusion after the Asiana Airlines crash in 2013 have dropped their lawsuit against the city and county of San Francisco.
Ye Meng Yuan was one of 307 passengers and crew members aboard Asiana Airlines Flight 214 on July 6, 2013, from South Korea to San Francisco International Airport and one of three that died in the crash. Another passenger died at the scene after being ejected from her seat, and a third died six days later.
The Boeing 777 struck the seawall just short of the runway. The plane crash-landed, sliding, rolling and then catapulting across the runway before coming to rest about 2,400 feet from the sea wall, to the left of the runway.
Ye left the burning plane on one of the evacuation slides, after which multiple city and county employees saw her on the ground near a paved cart road by the slide, according to the lawsuit filed on August 13, 2014, by her parents, Gan Ye and Xiao Yun Zheng.
The parents said that rescue workers saw their daughter lying helpless on the ground after the crash "but, inexplicably, failed to evaluate her condition, treat her, mark her location, or remove her from the perilous location where she lay curled in the 'fetal position.' Minutes later, Ye Meng Yuan was run over by two separate aircraft-rescue firefighting vehicles," the lawsuit said.
Asiana Airlines was not a party to the lawsuit.
The impact of the emergency vehicle hitting Ye "caused devastating blunt force traumatic injuries that resulted in her untimely death. At the time she was run over by the 'ARFF Unit 10,' all of the other passengers and crew members who were on board Flight 214 had been removed from the close proximately of the aircraft and were outside any zone of danger," according to the complaint.
Gan Ye and Xiao Yun Zheng's attorney, Gretchen Nelson of Kreindler and Kreindler, was unavailable for comment.
City Attorney Dennis Herrera issued a statement saying, "Our hearts go out to the parents of Ye Ming Yuan and to all the surviving loved ones of the three who lost their lives in the tragic crash of Asiana Flight 214. We're grateful for a dismissal that will spare everyone involved the added heartache and costs of litigation, which we believed from the beginning to be without legal merit."
He added, "As we remember those who lost their lives in the Asiana crash, I hope we acknowledge, too, the heroic efforts of San Francisco's firefighters and police who saved hundreds of lives that day. With thousands of gallons of venting jet fuel threatening unimaginable calamity, our firefighters initiated a daring interior search-and-rescue that within minutes extricated trapped passengers, and moved them safely to medical triage. In the face of great danger to their own lives, our emergency responders showed heroism and selflessness that day. They deserve our honor and gratitude."
Investigators determined pilot error played a major factor in the crash, finding the flight crew's "over-reliance on automation and a lack of systems understanding" led to a runway approach that was too low and slow to safely land the plane.
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