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Key Points
  • An Air India flight with 242 passengers crashed on Thursday, resulting in just one confirmed survivor.
  • The aircraft sent out a mayday signal right after taking off.
  • An investigation is underway into what is believed to be the first fatal crash involving a Dreamliner.
A Boeing 787 Dreamliner, carrying 242 individuals, crashed after departing from Ahmedabad, India, heading to London. Authorities report one survivor from the plane and at least 24 casualties on the ground.
Police confirmed that 265 bodies were transported to a hospital in the primary city of Gujarat, India’s western state.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi expressed being “stunned and saddened” by the incident.
“This is a tragedy beyond words,” he stated on X, noting his communication with officials assisting victims.

Here’s what is currently known about what is reportedly the first fatal crash of Boeing’s Dreamliner.

A map showing where a plane crashed shortly after taking off. An inset shows the city of Ahmedabad in India's west.

The aircraft collided with a building occupied by doctors and their families in a densely populated area of Ahmedabad, a city of approximately eight million inhabitants. Source: SBS News

What happened to the India Air flight that crashed?
The Boeing 787-8 jet heading for London’s Gatwick Airport left Ahmedabad with 242 people on board, including two pilots and 10 cabin crew.
Air India flight 171 issued a mayday call and crashed “immediately after takeoff”, around 1.40 pm local time, India’s Directorate General of Civil Aviation said.
Videos posted on social media, which Agence France-Presse (AFP) was not able to immediately verify, showed the jet losing altitude — with its nose up — before it hit a medical staff hostel and exploded into a ball of fire.

Air India said the passengers included 169 Indians, 53 British, seven Portuguese nationals and a Canadian.

Security guards stand outside a hospital building labelled 'post mortem room'

Security personnel in India stood near the morgue of a civil hospital where the victims’ bodies were taken for further inquiry following the crash near Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International Airport in Ahmedabad. Source: AAP / Rajat Gupta/EPA

Where did the Air India flight crash?
The plane smashed into a building housing doctors and their families in a crowded residential area of Ahmedabad, a city home to about eight million people.
At the site of the crash between a hospital and the Ghoda Camp neighbourhood, an AFP journalist saw people recovering bodies and firefighters spraying water on the smouldering wreckage.
A resident, who declined to be named, said: “We saw people from the building jumping from the second and third floor to save themselves. The plane was in flames.”

“When we reached the spot there were several bodies lying around and firefighters were dousing the flames,” another resident, Poonam Patni, told AFP, adding that many of the bodies were burned.

Firefighters spray a burnt out building

A building burnt out by the fireball that followed the plane crash. Source: AAP / Siddharaj Solanki/EPA

A doctor named Krishna said that “the nose and front wheel landed on the canteen building where students were having lunch”.

He said he saw “about 15 to 20 burned bodies”, while he and his colleagues rescued around 15 students.

Who was the sole survivor of the crash?
He was quoted by Indian media as saying: “Thirty seconds after take-off, there was a loud noise and then the plane crashed. It all happened so quickly.”
Doctors told local media that he did not sustain any major injuries.
“The side of the plane I was in landed on the ground, and I could see that there was space outside the aircraft, so when my door broke I tried to escape through it and I did,” Viswashkumar said.
“The opposite side of the aircraft was blocked by the building wall so nobody could have come out of there.”

Viswashkumar said he walked out of the crash site with only burn injuries on his left arm.

Police said 265 bodies had been recovered from the site.
Ahmadabad airport closed with all flights suspended until further notice.
Air India chair Natarajan Chandrasekaran said an emergency centre had been activated and a support team set up for families seeking information.

Tata Group, owners of Air India, offered financial aid of 10 million rupees ($179,000) to the families of each victim and promised to cover the medical expenses of the injured.

A man holding a torch walks through building and plane wreckage

Air India flight AI171 was bound for London carrying 242 passengers and crew members on board a Boeing 787-8 aircraft and crashed minutes after take-off in the Meghaninagar area of Ahmedabad. Source: AAP / Rajat Gupta/EPA

An investigation has begun

India’s aviation minister Ram Mohan Naidu Kinjarapu said a formal investigation had been started and US plane maker Boeing said it was “working to gather more information” on the incident to help Air India.
The British and US accident investigation agencies said they had sent teams to support the Indian inquiry.
A source close to the case said this was the first time a 787 Dreamliner had crashed.
The Boeing 787 Dreamliner is the pride of the US company’s catalogue for long-distance planes: a fuel-efficient, wide-body, lightweight aircraft able to transport up to 330 people.
“Our deepest condolences go out to the loved ones of the passengers and crew on board Air India Flight 171, as well as everyone affected in Ahmedabad,” said Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg, adding in a statement that he told Air India’s chair Boeing would support the investigation.
The plane was delivered to Air India in 2014 and had more than 41,000 hours of flying time, according to consultancy Cirium.

That makes Thursday’s tragedy different from the two fatal Boeing 737 MAX crashes in 2018 and 2019 that involved planes Boeing had only recently delivered to airlines.

A central factor in both MAX crashes was the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System, a flight handling system that badly malfunctioned, pointing to design flaws.
The MAX crashes plunged Boeing into a years-long slump extended by fresh safety problems early in 2024. Boeing has reported annual losses the last six years.
Since introducing the Dreamliner into service in 2011, Boeing has had to make some changes, mainly due to assembly faults and manufacturing quality issues.
The plane was also scrutinised in an April 2024 US Senate hearing that aired criticism from a whistleblower who testified that he was ostracised after reporting serious manufacturing defects on the 787 and the 777.
Additional reporting by AAP
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