"Pilot's Last Message Was 'Mayday'": Aviation Ministry On Ahmedabad Air Crash

The pilots of London-bound Air India flight AI-171 - which crashed 36 seconds after take-off from Ahmedabad - sent one last radio message to Air Traffic Control at 1.39 pm, the Aviation Ministry said Saturday afternoon. The Ministry said the pilots made the distress call after the plane failed to rise above 650 feet. But the ATC's responses got no reply; the plane had crashed by then.

"Mayday, Mayday..." were the final words of Captain Sumeet Sabharwal and his crew before the heavily-fuelled Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner crashed into a college students' hostel in a residential area near the airport, exploding into a fireball that killed all but one of the 242 people on board.

Overall 274 deaths have been confirmed, including those on the ground, in India's worst aviation disaster in nearly 15 years; that was in May 2010 when an Air India Boeing 737 flight from Dubai overshot the runway at Mangaluru airport and crashed into a gorge, killing 158 people on board.

In a press conference today SK Sinha, the Aviation Ministry Secretary, said the authorities were notified of the crash "around 2 pm", which is about 20 minutes after the plane crashed.

"... we received information the plane from Ahmedabad to Gatwick London had crashed. We immediately got detailed information about this through Ahmedabad ATC ... there were a total of 242 people on board, consisting of 230 passengers, 10 crew, and two pilots," Mr Sinha said.

"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 pilot informed Ahmedabad ATC that it was a 'mayday', i.e., a full emergency. When ATC tried to contact, it did not receive a response."

"After exactly a minute the plane crashed in Medhaninagar, which is two kilometres from the airport. The Captain was Sumeet Sabharwal and the First Officer was Clive Sundar."

Meanwhile, in the wake of speculation about the readiness of the plane and possible mechanical, electronic, or technical issues, the Aviation Ministry said the same plane had completed the Paris-Delhi-Ahmedabad sector "without any accident".

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The aircraft's black box has been found and more than 100 workers and 40 engineers are engaged in efforts to remove wreckage of the plane from where it crashed, NDTV was told.

Aviation experts said that going by the available visuals, lack of thrust in both engines and a bird hit could be among the probable causes. Visuals from the wreckage area showed bodies being pulled out and the injured, many with burns, wheeled into the city civil hospital close by.

Of the 242 on board, only one person - an Indian-origin British national - survived the crash.

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Former Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani was among those who were killed.

With input from agencies