The information collected from the plane's cockpit voice recorder and flight data recorder indicated that there were no signs of trouble until seven seconds before impact, when the crew tried to accelerate, the airport representatives indicate. A warning sounded four seconds before impact, and the crew tried to abort the landing and initiate what's known as a "go around" manoeuvre just 1.5 seconds before crashing. Officials also indicate that the air speed was significantly below the target airspeed at the time of the accident.

The crash resulted in multiple injuries and two confirmed deaths of teenage Chinese girls. On Sunday, the local fire department said that an emergency vehicle rushing to the scene of the crash may have run over one of the two teenage Chinese girls killed in the incident. San Francisco's medical examiner is now conducting an autopsy to determine the cause of the girl's death, officials say. More than 180 people were injured in the crash, at least two dozen of them seriously. Six people remained in critical condition at San Francisco General Hospital on Sunday, including one girl and 13 others were in less serious condition. Some of the injured at San Francisco general suffered spinal fractures, including paralysis, and others sustained head trauma and abdominal injuries.

Airport representatives said it was too early to speculate on the cause of the crash. Witnesses indicate that the plane came in too low, lifted its nose in an attempt to gain altitude, and then the rear of the aircraft hit a seawall at the approach to the runway.

The dead were identified as Ye Meng Yuan and Wang Lin Jia, both 16-year-old girls and described as Chinese nationals who are students, Asiana Airlines said. They had been seated at the rear of the aircraft, according to government officials in Seoul and Asiana, and were found outside the airplane.

The crash was the first fatal accident involving the Boeing 777, a popular long-range jet that has been in service since 1995. It was the first fatal commercial airline accident in the United States since a regional plane operated by Colgan Air crashed in New York in 2009.

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