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270 bodies brought to Ahmedabad Civil Hospital after plane crash: Doctors
A total of 270 bodies of the victims of the Air India plane crash have been brought to the Ahmedabad Civil Hospital so far, its doctors said on Saturday.
The authorities had earlier pegged the death toll at 265. In the last 24 hours, the city fire brigade has recovered one body as well as some body parts from the plane crash site, officials said.
"Around 270 bodies have been brought to the civil hospital so far from the plane crash site," President of Junior Doctors' Association of BJ Medical College, Dr Dhaval Gameti, told PTI. The process of identification of victims by matching the DNA samples is currently underway, and the bodies will be handed over to their relatives once the process is complete.
The Ahmedabad Fire and Emergency Service (AFES) has recovered some human body parts as well as a corpse in the last 24 hours from the plane crash site in the Meghaninagar area.
The Boeing 787 Dreamliner (AI 171) flight with 242 passengers and crew members on board crashed into a medical hostel and its canteen complex in Meghaninagar moments after taking off from the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International Airport on Thursday afternoon. Additional Chief Fire Officer Jayesh Khadia said, "Our firemen, who are helping forensic and aviation experts in their investigation at the crash site, found some body parts from the canteen's rubble on Friday, while a body was found today morning." He said that since the tail fin of the aircraft was stuck on top of the canteen's damaged building, cranes have been roped in to bring it down. "We will start the work of removing the tail fin from the building and bring it down to the ground once Air India officials arrive at the site," Khadia said.
After the crash, senior police officials had informed the media that at least 265 people were killed in the crash, which included passengers and other victims on the ground.
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Indian Express
23 minutes ago
- Indian Express
Air India plane crash: Ansari's video clue points to equipment-linked emergency, possible power backup deployment; Flight Data Recorder holds key
A video of the last moments of the doomed Air India Boeing 787-8 could offer new insight into the crash till the time the flight data recorder (FDR) data is analysed. The video, shot by a class 12 student and amateur terrace photographer Aryan Ansari, could challenge a few theories doing the rounds on what might have led to the crash in Ahmedabad—the deadliest disaster involving an Indian airline in decades and the world's first-ever Boeing 787 crash. While aviation experts did speculate whether the APU (Auxiliary Power Unit) or RAT (Ram Air Turbine)—both emergency power sources on the aircraft—were deployed, the clearer video sourced directly from Ansari's phone seems to suggest that the RAT was down. That ties in with what the sole survivor testified to—a loud bang accompanied by the light going out, and then a green light coming in the cabin. And the captain's mayday call. The bang could be indicative of a lower hatch giving way and the RAT being deployed automatically, a regulatory source said, while adding that there could be other triggers for a loud sound too. The RAT is essentially a wind turbine located just behind the landing gear console that deploys into the airstream to generate power only when primary and secondary power sources fail. The APU is a smaller turbine engine, typically located in the tail section of the aircraft, that provides electrical and pneumatic power for various on-board systems. Now, a dual engine failure is the rarest-of-rare event. But if the RAT deployed, it means there was a grave emergency—either a total electrical failure, a debilitating hydraulic failure, or a dual-engine failure, or a combination of these or more factors. Given the appearance of not sufficient lift and loss of thrust, the dual-engine failure theory, which many experts earlier said was not probable but still theoretically possible, could now well be a leading question for investigators to look into. At a media briefing on Saturday, Civil Aviation Minister K Ram Mohan Naidu had said that investigators will look at all the theories doing the rounds. To be sure, it is too early to jump to any conclusion based on the initial video evidence, considering aircraft are extremely sophisticated and complex machines and detailed and painstaking investigations are required to ascertain the exact cause or combination of causes. All that the clearer video now available does, however, is provide investigators with a crucial clue. Fuel contamination or clogging of fuel can lead to the engines being starved, leading to a sudden shutdown. A source at the airport did indicate that refuelling took longer than usual (at 42 minutes), but a few others indicated that this was not really an out-of-the-ordinary occurrence for a long-distance international flight with full load. Could it have been bird strikes? The footage available so far does not seem to suggest that. Also, although the Ahmedabad airport has a higher-than-average count of bird hits compared to other airports in the country, it would again be a rarest-of-rare event for a bird hit to disable both engines together. So far, there is no evidence to suggest such a significant bird strike, neither in the initial footage of the aircraft accident, nor at the airfield in the form of bird carcasses. Coming to the RAT deployment, the device is a last resort for providing basic power to the aircraft when everything else fails. But the RAT is more useful at higher or cruising altitudes, giving the pilots enough time to land at the closest available airfield. Neither time nor altitude was available to the pilots of flight AI-171. The plane had just lifted off the runway and was barely at an altitude of 625 feet—400-odd feet if Ahmedabad airport's 200-feet elevation is accounted for—before it crashed within moments. The odds that an aviation accident has a single trigger are rare, and crashes usually have a series of things that go wrong together or one leading to another. The one thing that experts were increasingly converging on before Ansari's clearer video emerged was that the landing gear of AI-171 was down and flaps were perhaps not retracted, well after the aircraft climbed off the runway. The possibility of an erroneous retraction of the flaps, instead of the gear, was a possibility that some were pointing to. The apparent lack of lift, something that the sole survivor attested to when he said the plane seemed to hang mid-air before going down, seemed to attest to this theory. The RAT deployment. though, changes all of this entirely. From the available videos, the rate of rotation (the action of pulling back a yoke or centre stick to lift the nose wheel off the ground during takeoff) appears to have been fine, but the undercarriage not being lifted up despite the aircraft being airborne is when things seem to have started going wrong. The landing gear should have been retracted by the time the time the aircraft reached 100 feet, after the 'positive rate' of climb is achieved, which is when the captain gives the 'gear up' command to the co-pilot for retracting the landing gear. The gear being down, along with incorrect wing flap configuration, together would lead to insufficient lift coupled with significant drag. Even a partial loss of thrust could have potentially impacted the lift given that landing gear was down. The pilots pulling the nose up towards the end seems to suggest a desperate move as the terrain warning would've started sounding in the cockpit While the FDR has been found, and will certainly provide deep insights into the reasons of the crash, the other black box—cockpit voice recorder (CVR)—will also be critical in the investigation, the details of the pilots' interaction with each other and the air traffic control will emerge from it, and so will the details of the warnings and alarms that would have been sounded in the cockpit before the fatal crash. Sukalp Sharma is a Senior Assistant Editor with The Indian Express and writes on a host of subjects and sectors, notably energy and aviation. He has over 13 years of experience in journalism with a body of work spanning areas like politics, development, equity markets, corporates, trade, and economic policy. He considers himself an above-average photographer, which goes well with his love for travel. ... Read More Anil Sasi is National Business Editor with the Indian Express and writes on business and finance issues. He has worked with The Hindu Business Line and Business Standard and is an alumnus of Delhi University. ... Read More
The Print
an hour ago
- The Print
Post Air India crash, Vadodara coffin maker races to deliver 100. Last bulk order was after Bhuj earthquake
In a large hall of the church, Nelvin's family and a dozen others from the Christian community are racing to finish the order, so that the coffins can be sent to the Civil Hospital Ahmedabad where the bodies are being kept. Nelvin wasn't prepared for such a large request. 'But I couldn't say no. This work is for the country. Even small children died in the accident,' he said to ThePrint, never pausing as he continued building coffins at the Centenary Methodist Church complex in Vadodara's Fatehganj area. Vadodara: Around 8 pm Friday—a day after the Air India 171 crash—Nelvin Bhai Rajwadi got a call from an Air India official in Ahmedabad. The official placed an urgent order for 100 coffins. Nelvin recalled, 'When I first got the call, I thought it would be just for a few coffins, but it turned out to be a bulk order. Within 2 hours, with support from the community, we managed to arrange plywood, white cloth, and other materials needed to make them,' he said. 'For the past 24 hours, we've been working non-stop.' Around 15 members of the Christian community were involved in the effort. On Friday night, plywood and cloth were transported to the church complex, and work began. 'We worked all night together to finish and help the administration in this tough time. We took it as a challenge…. We got a chance to serve the country and this is our contribution,' said Nelvin, adding that a coffin that would normally costs Rs 6,000 is being provided for Rs 3,000 for this order. On Saturday night at 10 pm, when ThePrint reached the Church complex, 35 coffins were loaded on the truck and sent to Ahmedabad. Nelvin is the only one to have received a bulk order. The administration ordered a few from Ahmedabad before the process of handing over bodies to families began Saturday. On Thursday afternoon, the London-bound Air India flight crashed near Ahmedabad airport minutes after takeoff. The flight was carrying 242 people, including crew members. All but one passenger—a British national of Indian origin—died in the crash. The crash also claimed several more lives when the aircraft slammed into the hostel mess of BJ Medical College. Most of the bodies, charred beyond recognition, are in the process of being identified through DNA testing. Civil Hospital Ahmedabad has also collected DNA samples from the relatives of all passengers and crew members who were on board the aircraft for DNA matching. The Gujarat government has created 230 teams to establish contact with families of victims of the plane crash. Also read: This Air India crash eyewitness cheated death by a whisker—'a blast, then a fireball, just 200 m away' In coffin making for three decades Nelvin, 60, has been in the coffin-making business for over three decades. The last time he received a bulk order from the administration was during the 2001 Bhuj earthquake. Nelvin recalled that during the Bhuj earthquake, they made coffins right on the roadside and managed to dispatch 40 of them at record speed. He has also supplied coffins to the Railways and the Air Force. Nelvin also runs an ambulance service in Vadodara. Until last year, he held a technical position at MS University, Vadodara, before retiring. 'We have seen many tough times but the scale this time is very big,' said Nelvin. It takes about 2 and a half hours to make one coffin which has a standard size of 6 feet by 2 feet, said Sanjeev, who has been doing this work for years. 'It's a difficult task,' he said, while fastening a coffin with a stapler, 'but it's nothing compared to what the families who lost their loved ones are going through.' Explaining the process, Sanjeev said that first a structure of a coffin is made from the raw material and then white cloth is wrapped around it. 'Nelvin bhai got a call and then reached out to everyone. We gathered here and started working. We're doing this for the people of the country,' said Aldrin Thomas, a social worker based in Vadodara. Breena Rajvadi, wife of Nelvin's son Arnish, immediately stepped in to help with the coffin-making as soon as she heard about the order. When I heard about the crash, I had a feeling that my father-in-law might get a call for coffins,' said Breena. 'We were thinking that Papa might be contacted, given the scale of the tragedy. And the next day, we got the order.' She added that making the coffins at speed has been an incredibly challenging task. Arnish, too, is hard at work beside his family. 'Mentally we were not prepared but we are working continuously to complete it. We worked all night and started working as soon as we got the phone call,' he said. (Edited by Zinnia Ray Chaudhuri) Also read: Air India crash: All 4 hostel buildings of BJ Medical College emptied amid site investigation
New Indian Express
an hour ago
- New Indian Express
'Thrust not achieved, falling, Mayday,' were the last words of Air India flight's pilot before crash
"Thrust not achieved... falling... communication line during this transmission very weak... Mayday!" were the last words spoken by the pilot of Air India flight AI171 before it crashed outside the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International Airport in Ahmedabad, minutes after takeoff on June 12. The pilot's last words indicate a mechanical failure which could have led to the tragic incident. The Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner, en route to London Gatwick, was operated by Capt Sumit Sabharwal, a highly experienced pilot with more than 8,000 hours of flying experience. Sabharwal was accompanied by co-pilot Clive Kunder, who had over 1,000 hours of flying experience. All but one out of the 242 people onboard, including crew and passengers were killed in addition to at least 29 people on ground as the aircraft nosedived minutes after take off, crashing into the students hostel of the B. J. Medical College in the Meghaninagar neighbourhood. Addressing a press briefing on Saturday, the Aviation Ministry said that the last message from the pilot of the plane was a "Mayday" call, after which the Air Traffic Control (ATC) lost contact with the aircraft. According to the ministry, the plane took off at 1:39 pm and within a few seconds, after reaching a height of about 650 feet, it started sinking, i.e., it started losing height. The ATC received the Mayday call at 1:39 pm, a minute after which the plane crashed.
