New Delhi [India], June 14 : Union Civil Aviation Minister Ram Mohan Naidu Kinjarapu on Saturday said that the Air India Flight that crashed in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, leaving 241 people dead, has shaken the entire nation.
Addressing a press briefing on Saturday, Naidu said, "The last two days have been very difficult, especially for the ministry and everyone else. The incident that happened in Ahmedabad has shaken the entire nation. My deepest condolences to the family members who have lost their loved ones in the incident. I have also personally lost my father to a road accident, so to a certain extent, I can understand the pain and anguish the family members are feeling."
"It was a moment of shock right after we got to know about the incident, but even in that disbelief, I personally rushed to the site to oversee what needed to be done and what support was needed. Once we rushed to the site, the government of Gujarat had already been working on the ground trying to rescue," he added.
The Minister said that the recovery of the Black Box from the debris was critical to the investigative process.
" The Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau, which was formed specifically to look into the incidents, accidents that happen around aircraft, was immediately mobilised. One important update from the technical investigation which is happening through the AAIB is the recovery of the black box yesterday around 5 pm from the site, the AAIB team believes that this decoding of the black box is going to give an in depth insight into what would have happened during the process of the crash or moments before the crash itself. We are also eagerly waiting for what the results or the report are going to be once the AAIB goes through its full investigation..."
Samir Kumar Sinha, Secretary of the Ministry of Civil Aviation, said, "On 12th June, around 2 PM, we received the information that the plane going from Ahmedabad to Gatwick, London, had crashed. We immediately got detailed information about this through ATC Ahmedabad. This was an AIC 171 and there were a total of 242 people on board, including 230 passengers, 2 pilots and 10 crew members. This 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. At 1:39 pm, the pilot informed Ahmedabad ATC that it was a May Day, i.e., a full emergency.
"According to ATC, when it tried to contact the plane, it did not receive any response. Exactly after 1 minute, this plane crashed in Medhaninagar, which is located at a distance of about 2 km from the airport. The captain of the plane was Sumit Sabharwal, and the first officer was Clive Sundar. As far as the entire history of the plane is concerned, before this accident, the plane had completed the Paris-Delhi-Ahmedabad sector without any accident. 'Due to the accident, the runway was closed at 2:30 pm, and after completing all the protocols, the runway of Ahmedabad was opened for limited flights from 5 PM,' he added. The AI-171 Boeing Dreamliner 787-8 aeroplane bound for London's Gatwick had crashed shortly after it took off from the Ahmedabad International Airport on Thursday. The airline said only one out of the 242 people on board the aircraft survived the crash.
Earlier, the government constituted a high-level multidisciplinary committee for examining the causes leading to the crash of Air India Flight AI-171.
The Committee will examine the existing Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) and guidelines issued to prevent and handle such occurrences and suggest comprehensive guidelines for dealing with such instances in the future," an order issued by the Civil Aviation Ministry read.
Earlier in the day, officials from the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) arrived in Ahmedabad, where the London-bound Air India flight crashed. The AAIB, a division under the Ministry of Civil Aviation, is responsible for probing aircraft accidents in India and has launched a formal investigation into the matter.