New Delhi, June 14 (IANS) The Aviation Ministry on Saturday said that the last words of the ill-fated Air India flight AI-171 radioed by the cockpit crew were a desperate “Mayday, Mayday”, moments before the London-bound aircraft crashed shortly after taking off from Ahmedabad which led to the deaths of 241 people.

The tragic crash occurred merely 36 seconds after take-off at 1:39 p.m., when the Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner—fully loaded with fuel—failed to climb beyond 650 feet.

Air Traffic Control (ATC) in Ahmedabad received the emergency distress signal, but lost contact soon after and seconds later, the flight crashed, which has sent shockwaves not just to affected parties but to the entire aviation sector and their safety measures.

The aircraft, unable to maintain altitude, plummeted and exploded into a fireball upon hitting a student hostel in Medhaninagar, a densely populated area just 2 kilometres from the airport. According to the Aviation Secretary S.K. Sinha, the ministry was alerted around 2:00 p.m., approximately 20 minutes after the disaster. “The aircraft had 242 people on board—230 passengers, 10 crew members, and two pilots,” he said in a press briefing on Saturday.

The captain of the ill-fated flight was Sumeet Sabharwal, with First Officer Clive Sundar in the co-pilot seat. Tragically, the crash claimed 241 lives, as the death toll is likely to surge—including those on the ground—making it India’s deadliest aviation tragedy since the 2010 Mangaluru crash, in which 158 people died.

The aircraft had earlier completed its Paris-Delhi-Ahmedabad journey without any reported technical anomalies. However, after taking off from Ahmedabad en route to Gatwick (London), the Dreamliner experienced what appears to be a catastrophic loss of thrust, with experts not ruling out possibilities such as bird strikes or engine failure.

According to the officials, investigators have recovered the black box, which is crucial to piecing together the exact sequence of events. Over 100 personnel, including 40 aviation engineers, have been deployed to aid in wreckage clearance and investigation efforts.

Of the 242 on board, only one person miraculously survived, but the tragic incident has reignited the debate on air safety.

–IANS

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