- Title: 'The plane broke into three parts': eyewitness describes India plane crash
- Date: 7th August 2020
- Summary: KARIPUR, KERALA, INDIA (AUGUST 7, 2020) (ANI - NO USE INDIA) SECURITY FORCES OUTSIDE AIRPORT AMBULANCE ARRIVING AT AIRPORT (SOUNDBITE) (Malayalam) UNNAMED EYEWITNESS, SAYING: "The plane broke into three parts. People were there in all three parts. There were few children... We saw children between the age group of two to eight years." HEALTH WORKERS IN PPE PUSHING MAN ON STRETCHER HEALTH WORKERS OUTSIDE HOSPITAL VARIOUS OF HEALTH WORKERS LOADING PATIENT ONTO AMBULANCE NEW DELHI, INDIA (AUGUST 7, 2020) (ANI - NO USE INDIA) (SOUNDBITE) (English) FORMER INDIAN MINISTER, K. J. ALPHONS, SAYING: "Prime Minister (and) everybody has basically been in touch with the Kerala chief minister, Kerala administration and they (Kerala) are doing everything possible." KARIPUR, KERALA, INDIA (AUGUST 7, 2020) (ANI - NO USE INDIA) VARIOUS OF AMBULANCE DRIVING AWAY
- Embargoed: 21st August 2020 21:05
- Keywords: India Kerala crash plane runway
- Location: KARIPUR, KERALA AND NEW DELHI, INDIA
- City: KARIPUR, KERALA AND NEW DELHI, INDIA
- Country: India
- Topics: Disaster/Accidents
- Reuters ID: LVA001CQ93YVB
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text:EDITORS PLEASE NOTE: AUDIO AS INCOMING
At least 17 people were killed and more than 100 injured when an Air India Express passenger plane repatriating Indians stranded by the COVID-19 pandemic overshot the runway in heavy rain near the southern city of Kozhikode on Friday, officials said on Friday (August 7).
The Boeing-737 flight from Dubai to Calicut International Airport was carrying 190 passengers and crew, the civil aviation ministry said in a statement. Among them were 10 infants.
Eyewitnesses described the plane breaking into pieces and said they saw children involved in the accident. The aircraft lay split into at least two chunks after the plane's fuselage sheared apart as it fell into a valley 35 feet below, authorities said.
Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri said authorities managed to rescue most of the passengers because the plane did not catch fire while descending the slope at the end of the table-top runway. Such runways are located at an altitude and have steep drops at one or both ends.
Local TV news channels showed passengers, some of them lying motionless on stretchers, brought into a hospital surrounded by health workers wearing masks because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The office of the chief minister of Kerala state, where the airport is located and which is home to a large number of Indians working in the Middle East, said that in addition to the 17 dead, 173 others had been hospitalized.
It was India's worst passenger aircraft accident since 2010, when another Air India Express flight from Dubai overshot the table-top runway at Mangalore, a city in the south, and slid down a hill, killing 158 people.
Media reports suggested the plane skidded off the runway of Calicut, crashing nose-first into the ground.
India, which shut down all air travel in late March to try to contain the novel coronavirus, has restarted limited international air travel. Air India Express AXB1344 was a government-operated repatriation flight for Indians previously unable to return home because of the travel restrictions.
TV visuals showed the aircraft's nose smashed into a brick wall, with much of the middle of the plane pulverized.
(Production: Helena Williams, Ben Dadswell) - Copyright Holder: ANI (India)
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