Indian plane crashes, killing 158; 8 survive
NEW DELHI -- An Air India Express plane overshot a table-top runway in southern India and tumbled off a cliff into a heavily wooded hilly area, killing 158 people, officials said.
The Boeing 727 from Dubai was carrying 160 passengers and six crew members when it crashed outside the city of Mangalore at 6:30 a.m. It then caught fire, hampering immediate rescue attempts from people in the neighboring village of Manapur.
Eight passengers were rescued and taken to local hospitals for treatment, Air India director Anup Srivastava said in a statement. "We are setting up helplines and contacting relatives and making arrangements for all possible rescue teams," he said.
Television images showed charred bodies being pulled out of the wreckage as firefighters worked to douse the flames. In one case, a child's limp, burned body was extricated from the smoldering plane by a policeman, who carried the child up a hill as other rescuers offered to pull him up.
"It all happened in just a few seconds," one survivor, Abdul Totuttur, said by telephone from the K.S. Hegde Hospital. "By the grace of Allah, I have survived. Fortunately I was on a window seat, 19 A of the flight."
Totuttur is a manager of a sporting goods shop in Dubai and was returning home to visit family for a 10-day break. He described his escape: "The right wing was on the ground, but the left wing of the plane was up in the air. Then I saw the plane break into two in the middle. I had very little time. But I jumped out, about eight feet. I had two other people (with me) who did the same.
"It was all black," Totuttur said. "I could hear people trapped inside screaming helplessly. I walked on fire for some time. I limped and fell and picked myself up again. When I turned back and looked, there was a loud explosion and smoldering fire."
Totuttur said he walked up a hill, where he encountered rescuers, who gave him water. His brother took him by car to the hospital, where his wife and 2-year-old daughter were waiting.
"I have injuries on my face and my hand," Totuttur said. "Allah has saved me."
Another survivor, Ummar Farooq, 27, spoke in similar tones about his escape. "The plane caught fire and came down in no time," he said by telephone. "I managed to open the emergency door and escaped. I don't know how I did it. Allah unlocked it for me."
Farooq, whose face and hands were burned as he escaped through fire, was brought to a nearby hospital in an auto rickshaw.
A young survivor told television reporters that he and some other survivors were taken to the hospital by motorcycle. "The plane landed, (it) sounded like the pilot tried to take off (again), and (it) crashed into the jungle," he said.
Sadananda Gowda, a member of Parliament from the area, told TV reporters that the plane overshot the runway by more than 300 yards and "automatically the pilot tried to take off ... again. The left wing of the plane crashed into the radar pole."
The pilot "did not have enough space to stop the aircraft" when he overshot the runway, said Janardhan Swamy, a lawmaker from Karnataka state. "There was no time for even sending distress signals to the command center." Swamy added that "rescue operations are over. It is mostly recovery going on now."
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh announced that about $4,000 would be paid to the families of those killed as immediate relief.
Jagan Nath, the Mangalore district health officer, said bodies of victims were transported to the morgue, where relatives and friends of passengers gathered. "They are crying. Things are very bad," he said.
Srivastava, the Air India director, said the aircraft "was definitely airworthy." Indian television reported that the pilot of Air India Express 812 had not advised air-traffic controllers of any mechanical issues before the crash.
A senior captain of Air India who regularly flies the Mangalore route said the runway was lengthened to about 8,000 feet from about 5,300 feet about three years ago.
"It is a safe airfield now," he said by telephone from Mumbai. "One edge of the runway is a steep drop. But we operate large aircraft there. It is adequate. ... This is hilly terrain. Within eight miles northeast of the runway, there are hills that are 6,000 feet high."
Rohit Rao, 41, a resident of Mangalore who did contracting work at the airport a year ago, was able to get near the crash site.
"There were 8 people on board, whom I knew," he said by cellphone from there. "All of them have died. My brother's friend was traveling with his wife and child. They are gone. My local banker whom I know very well, his wife and child are gone. My school classmate's husband and mother died. I am dreading bad news every time my cellphone rings now. I don't know how many more people I will find out about.
"I can see where it has crashed. I see the cliff from where it dropped," Rao said, adding that the tail of the plane was visible. "It is obvious that the pilot has overshot badly. The plane has plowed through the trees."
Saturday's crash may rank as the country's deadliest aircraft disaster since 1996, when 349 people died after Saudi and Kazakh passenger planes collided in midair above north India.
