The lone passenger to survive the Air India crash that killed 241 people on board Thursday found himself near debris after being thrown out of the plane and walked to a nearby ambulance for aid, a medic said.
A doctor at Ahmedabad’s Civil Hospital identified the man as Vishwash Kumar Ramesh, and Indian Home Minister Amit Shah said he met the survivor. The airline said he was a British national of Indian origin.
Ramesh is “doing well” but “psychologically disturbed” by the event, according to the medical director of the Civil Hospital.
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WATCH HERE“He was disoriented with multiple injuries all over his body,” Dr. Dhaval Gameti, who treated Ramesh, told The Associated Press. “But he seems to be out of danger.”
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SIGN UP Another medic said Ramesh told him that immediately after the plane took off, it began descending and suddenly split in two, throwing him out before a loud explosion.
Video broadcast by Indian news channels appeared to show a bloodied Ramesh walking away from the crash site and people running behind him.
Ramesh, who had his boarding pass with him in the hospital, told local newspaper Hindustan Times that he saw bodies and parts of the plane strewn around the crash site.
“When I got up, there were bodies all around me. I was scared. I stood up and ran,” he told the newspaper.
"It all happened so quickly," he added.
Ramesh was traveling to London with his brother, his cousin, Ajay Valgi, told the BBC.
Ramesh spoke to his father just before takeoff and then again after the plane crashed, his family told Sky News.
The survivor was dazed, saying he couldn't find his brother or any other passengers, and that he did not know how he lived, his other brother, Nayan Kumar Ramesh, told the news outlet.
“I don’t know where my brother is, I don’t see any other passengers. I don’t know how I’m alive, how I exited the plane,” Nayan Kumar Ramesh reported his brother saying.
He said he has “no words to describe” the crash.
“This is a miracle that he survived,” Nayan said of Vishwash. “But what other miracle for my other brother?”
The city's police commissioner initially said none of the people aboard the London-bound plane survived the crash. G.S. Malik, police commissioner for Ahmedabad, noted “some locals would have also died” when the plane crashed into a residential area where offices were also located.
“Exact figures on casualties are being ascertained,” he said.
Divyansh Singh, vice president of the Federation of All India Medical Association, said at least five students from the medical college were killed on the ground and 50 others were injured. Singh said some of them were in critical condition and many people are “feared buried in the debris.”
The Boeing 787 Dreamliner was carrying 230 passengers and 12 crew members when it crashed and burst into flames near the airport in Ahmedabad, with 169 Indians, 53 Britons, seven Portuguese and one Canadian aboard.
Firefighters doused the smoking wreckage of the plane, which would have been fully loaded with fuel shortly after takeoff, and adjacent multistory buildings with water. Charred bodies lay on the ground and parts of the fuselage were scattered around the site. Indian army teams were assisting civil authorities to clear debris and help treat the injured.
A video on social media showed the jet slowly descending as if it were landing. As soon as it disappeared out of view behind rows of houses, a giant fireball filled the sky.
At the crash site, the tail cone of the aircraft with damaged stabilizer fins still attached to it was lodged near the top of one of the buildings.
India’s aviation regulatory body said the aircraft gave a mayday call, signaling an emergency, but then did not respond to the calls made by the airport traffic control.
This is the first crash of a Boeing 787 Dreamliner, according to the Aviation Safety Network database. Boeing said it was “working to gather more information.”
“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," Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg said in a statement. "I have spoken with Air India Chairman N. Chandrasekaran to offer our full support, and a Boeing team stands ready to support the investigation led by India’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau.”
