At least 120 people have died when a passenger plane caught fire at a South Korean airport after it veered off the runway and crashed into a concrete fence.

Two crew members were rescued after the accident, which occurred at 9:03 a.m. local time (00:03 GMT) on Sunday.

The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport said the plane – a 15-year-old Boeing 737-800 jet – was returning from Bangkok and its passengers included two Thai nationals.

Rescue workers tried to free people from the Jeju Air plane carrying 181 passengers at the airport in the city of Muan, about 290 km (180 miles) south of Seoul, according to the National Fire Agency.

The fire department was deployed with 32 fire engines and several helicopters to contain the fire, it said.

At least 120 people – 57 women, 54 men and nine others whose gender was not immediately apparent – died in the fire, the fire department said.

The death toll is expected to rise further as the remaining passengers on board the plane are still missing about six hours after the incident – making it one of South Korea’s worst aviation disasters.

Footage of the crash broadcast by television channel YTN showed the Jeju Air plane skidding down the runway, apparently with the landing gear still closed, and colliding head-on with a concrete wall on the edge of the airport.

Other local television stations broadcast footage showing thick columns of black smoke from the plane engulfed in flames.

Lee Jeong-hyeon, head of the Muan Fire Station, said in a televised news conference that rescue workers were continuing to search for bodies scattered by the impact.

The plane was destroyed and only the tail unit was visible among the rubble, he said.

Workers were considering several possibilities for the cause of the crash, including whether the plane was struck by birds that caused mechanical problems, Lee said.

Senior Transportation Ministry official Joo Jong-wan separately told reporters that government investigators had arrived at the scene to investigate the cause of the crash and fire.