‘I don't know how I survived:' Sole survivor of India plane crash speaks out
Vishwash Kumar Ramesh is the sole survivor of an Air India flight that crashed shortly after takeoff. In an interview, Ramesh relives the harrowing moments when he escaped the plane.
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Sole survivor of Air India crash describes failed takeoff and disbelief at being alive
NEW DELHI -- The lone passenger who survived an Air India crash couldn't believe he was alive when he opened his eyes and was surrounded by flames, debris and charred bodies. Viswashkumar Ramesh, a British national of Indian origin, was on the flight headed to London that crashed minutes after taking off from India's northwestern city of Ahmedabad on Thursday afternoon. The accident killed 241 people on board and at least 29 on the ground. Recovery teams working until late Friday found at least 25 more bodies in the debris, officials said. It was one of India's worst aviation disasters and the first crash for a Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner since the widebody, twin-engine planes went into service in 2009, according to the Aviation Safety Network database. Ramesh narrated his ordeal to India's national broadcaster from a local government hospital, saying the aircraft felt like it became stuck in midair within a few seconds of takeoff. Green and white lights flashed and the aircraft accelerated but seemed unable to gain height before the plane struck a medical college hostel in a residential area. He saw several passengers and crew members lose their lives. His brother was one of those who perished on board. Seated in 11A, Ramesh said his side of the plane landed on the ground floor of a building. He unfastened his seat belt and forced himself out through an open door. 'When I opened my eyes, I realized I was alive,' said Ramesh, who recalled parts of the plane strewn around the crash site. Ramesh sustained burn injuries on his left hand and walked some distance in shock before he was assisted by local residents and taken by ambulance to a hospital. Another brother told Sky News that Ramesh called his father moments after the crash to say he had survived but wasn't aware of what happened to his brother who was on the flight with him. 'He video called my dad as he crashed and said, 'Oh the plane's crashed. I don't know where my brother is. I don't see any other passengers. I don't know how I'm alive, how I exited the plane,'' Nayan Kumar Ramesh said. Ramesh's cousin, Ajay Valgi, told the BBC that Ramesh called relatives in Leicester, England, after the crash. 'He only said that he's fine, nothing else,' said Valgi, adding that Ramesh has a wife and a 'little boy' at home. The family is 'happy that he's OK, but we're still upset about the other brother.' Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who went to the crash site Friday, also visited the lone survivor in the hospital. 'I told Modi what all I had witnessed. He also enquired about my health,' Ramesh said from his bed. Dr. Dhaval Gameti said Ramesh, who kept his boarding pass with him in the hospital, was disoriented with multiple injuries over his body but seemed to be out of danger as the medical staff continued to monitor him. 'He is doing very well and will be ready to be discharged anytime soon,' Gameti said Saturday.
Yahoo
3 hours ago
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The astonishing stories of five air crash sole survivors
A British national has been named as the only survivor of the Air India disaster in Ahmedabad. Vishwash Kumar Ramesh, 40, from London, was returning to the UK after visiting family with his brother, who was also on the flight in a different row. Remarkable footage taken shortly after the crash shows a bloodied Ramesh walking through a crowd. 'When I got up, there were bodies all around me. I was scared. I stood up and ran. There were pieces of the plane all around me,' he told the Hindustan Times from hospital. Throughout history, there have been at least 100 examples of sole survivors emerging from the wreckage of air disasters, covering military, cargo and commercial aircraft. The first example was on March 17, 1929, when Lou Foote, the 34-year-old pilot of a sightseeing plane, survived a crash in Newark, New Jersey. What is notable is the young age of many of these survivors. Of the 77 whose ages are known, the average age is 24 and the oldest is 52. The youngest, a Thai national who survived a Vietnam Airlines crash in 2003, was just 14 months old. Given the inevitably high death tolls, each story of a sole survivor is both remarkable and tragic, particularly when there is a child involved. The following five are among the best-known case studies in aviation history. On Christmas Eve 1971, Juliane Koepcke boarded a domestic flight in Peru with her mother, Maria. They did so against the advice of Koepcke's father, Hans-Wilhelm, who warned of LANSA's poor safety record. The plane was struck by lightning in mid-flight and the plane rapidly began to fall apart, before losing altitude. Kopecke recalls the experience of falling, while still strapped into her row of seats, for 10,000ft (3,000m) into the thick of the Amazon rainforest. Miraculously, Juliane Koepcke survived the fall with an eye injury, a cut on her right arm, a broken collarbone and concussion. There are various theories as to how she survived the fall, but it is thought that the updraught of the thunderstorm, the dense canopy of the forest and the fact she was attached to a row of three seats – acting as a kind of crude parachute – could have contributed. She spent 11 days following a creek within the jungle, during which she suffered a botfly larvae infestation in her wounded arm. On the ninth day, she came across a lumberjack encampment where she was offered rudimentary medical assistance (gasoline was poured on her arm) and put on an 11-hour canoe to the nearest inhabited area, where she was airlifted to hospital. Her mother did not survive the accident. Koepcke, now 70, went on to become an expert in mammalogy, specialising in bats. Today she works as a librarian at the Bavarian State Collection of Zoology in Munich. Vesna Vulović is believed to be the person to have survived the highest fall without a parachute, at an altitude of 6.31 miles (33,333ft). When a briefcase bomb exploded on the JAT flight, at this point at cruising altitude, the plane broke apart over a remote Czechoslovakian village. It is believed that Vulović survived because while all of the other passengers and flight crew were blown out of the aircraft, Vulović was unwittingly pinned inside the fuselage by a food trolley. Because the fuselage landed in a thickly wooded, snow-covered mountainside, it is thought that the impact was softened. The fact that Vulović had a history of low blood pressure, causing her to pass out as the cabin depressurised, could have also helped her to survive the fall. After the crash, Vulović suffered a fractured skull, cerebral haemorrhage, two broken legs and three broken vertebrae, as well as a fractured pelvis and several broken ribs. Within a year of the accident she had regained the ability to walk, although she suffered from a limp for the rest of her life. In a later interview with the New York Times, she was asked why she thought she survived the accident. 'Serbian stubbornness,' she said. 'And a childhood diet of chocolate, spinach and fish oil.' The deadliest accident to date with a sole survivor (a record which may be revised once the final death toll of the Air India disaster is confirmed) occurred shortly after take-off in Detroit. Then aged just four, Cecelia Cichan was travelling home to Tempe, Arizona alongside her mother, father and six-year-old brother. While searching the wreckage, firemen found Cichan still strapped into her seat, having sustained third degree burns and fractures to her skull, collarbone and left leg. As the subject of intense media interest, Cichan received more than $150,000 in donations that was put into a trust. In an interview with the Daily Mirror in 2012, she said: 'I never go on a day without thinking about the people on Flight 255,' she said. 'It's kind of hard not to think about it. When I look in the mirror, I have visual scars'. She had an aeroplane tattooed onto her wrist, as a daily reminder of the tragedy that she survived. The Yemenia Airbus A310-324 had been in service for 19 years, accumulating 53,000 flight hours when it crashed off the north coast of Grande Comore, Comoros, an island nation in the Indian Ocean. Later investigations found that, amid strong winds, the airline stalled and crashed into the sea. Since the Comoros had no sea-rescue capacity, French military aircraft and a boat from neighbouring islands Réunion and Mayotte were sent to conduct a formal search effort. The plane wreckage was found off the coastal town of Mitsamiouli, and among the bodies was 12-year-old Bahia Bakari, who was seen holding onto a piece of debris in the water. It later emerged she had been clinging onto it for 13 hours. With the help of local fishermen, Bakari was rescued and taken to a hospital in Paris with a fractured collarbone, hypothermia and cuts to her face. In the early morning on May 12, an Afriqiyah Airways Airbus A330-202 approached Tripoli Airport in Libya. The conditions were calm, with good visibility, and the crew was cleared to continue their approach. As the aircraft approached the runway, however, the crew was alerted that the weather had deteriorated and that the airport was shrouded in mist. After one failed landing attempt, the aircraft crashed just beside the runway at a speed of 302mph. On board were passengers from several countries including the United Kingdom, France and the United States. The sole survivor was a nine-year-old Dutch boy named Ruben van Assouw, who had been on safari with his family (all of whom died in the accident). The child had multiple fractures in both legs, but no life threatening injuries. It is believed he survived because he was flung from the wreckage moments before it burst into flames. Van Assouw's survival story was partial inspiration for Ann Napolitano's coming-of-age novel, Dear Edward, about the sole survivor of a plane crash. The book was later adapted into a TV series.
Yahoo
5 hours ago
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Prayers for doctor and family killed in plane crash
Friends and colleagues have gathered to remember a family who died in the Air India plane crash. More than 240 people were killed on Thursday when a Boeing 787 bound for Gatwick crashed shortly after take-off in Ahmedabad. On Saturday at Derby Hindu Temple, prayers were said for Dr Prateek Joshi, a radiologist at Royal Derby Hospital, who was also onboard the flight along with his wife and 3 children. Manog Ramtohal, who worked at the same trust, said: "I don't think we will ever get over it." The plane was carrying 242 people when it crashed shortly after taking off from Ahmedabad airport, in western India. There were 169 Indian nationals, 53 Britons, seven Portuguese nationals and one Canadian on the flight. Dr Joshi moved from India to Derby in 2021 and worked at University Hospitals of Derby and Burton NHS Foundation Trust for four years, the trust said. Mr Ramtohal said: "It is like someone has been amputated from that department, it's something I don't think we will ever get over. "Always generous, always willing to help, nothing was too little [for him to look after]. "He worked with politeness, courtesy and good manners. "Part of the tragedy is he was getting better and better and we will never know what he could have achieved, what he could have given to the community." Gisela Robinson, executive chief medical officer at Royal Derby Hospital, said: "Talking to the department yesterday it is clear how cherished he was by all of his colleagues and it has ripped a hole in the department. "Kind, happy-go-lucky clinician who really knitted the department together. "It felt right to come and pay our respects today." Follow BBC Derby on Facebook, on X, or on Instagram. Send your story ideas to eastmidsnews@ or via WhatsApp on 0808 100 2210. Newly engaged couple among Air India crash victims Doctor and family among Air India crash victims Derby Hindu Temple
