Global News Podcast - Air India flight to London crashes in Ahmedabad with 242 on board

Episode Date: June 12, 2025

Air India flight to London crashes after take-off in Gujarat. It's reported there are no survivors. The airline says 169 Indian nationals, 53 Britons, a Canadian national and seven Portuguese nationals were on the flight

This is a special edition of the Global News podcast from the BBC World Service on the Indian plane crash. I'm Jackie Leonard and we'll be bringing you what we know so far at 1130 GMT. The headlines, it was an Air India flight from Ahmedabad bound for London Gatwick. It was a Boeing 7878 Dreamliner. There were more than 240 people on board and it came down in a residential area. An Air India plane has crashed into a residential area near an airport in India's western city of Ahmedabad, seconds after takeoff. The head of the Civil Aviation Authority says there

were more than 240 people on board the Boeing 7878 Dreamliner en route for London. The federal health minister said many people have been killed but didn't give figures. Videos on social media show thick black smoke rising into the sky. This man said he was sitting at home and there was a loud noise. It felt like an earthquake. He says, I came out and saw smoke. I didn't know it was a plane crash. Once I came here, then I found out. I saw the crashed plane, many bodies lying. Our Delhi correspondent Arunadeh Mukherjee gave this update to my colleague Anita McVey. The last major statement came in from the Prime Minister himself, Prime Minister Narendra

Modi, putting out a statement on his official handle on X where he said that he was stunned and saddened by what had happened and it was heartbreaking to see what was going on. He said that he's personally monitoring the situation and I think stunned is the word that seems to be translating on the ground as well as we get those very, very shocking and tragic ground reports, many of them coming in from what you heard my colleague Roxy say from the ground there because it was a situation that just changed within seconds the plane took off and it had barely reached 600 feet within seconds it had lost contact with the air traffic control after making a distress call following which as per reports that it fell outside the perimeter of the Ahemdabad

airport that's when the people who were nearby, absolutely unexpected that this was going to happen, suddenly heard a very loud explosion is what we're hearing from eyewitness accounts on the ground. And then following that explosion, they saw huge plumes of black smoke emanating from that particular area. And I think what has really added to the gravity of the tragedy that we're seeing is, of course, the air crash, but also taking place in that residential area, making things even more tragic there on the ground.

What we do know is it's a developing situation on the ground. As you can imagine, rescue teams, relief workers are there. Hundreds of volunteers in the area are also there. The police has cordoned off the area. The airport is, of course, shut. And they're trying to sort of bring out as many people as possible. Our reporters on the ground mentioned that they did see some bodies also being brought out.

Having said that, we're also waiting for some sort of official announcement on the number of injured, but we were told that a lot of officials were making their way to the hospitals to meet those who were injured. This is, as I said, it's a fast developing story. We're constantly getting updates there from the ground, but it's an active situation. And what we also heard from people on the ground was that firefighters were trying to douse the flames which were still blazing there on the ground. So you can imagine the scene really, a residential area completely left stunned

when a massive Boeing Dreamliner comes crashing down within minutes after takeoff. The loud bang followed by a huge plume of smoke. Over 240 passengers there on board that flight 242, according to the Director General of Civil Aviation and 10 crew members and two pilots who were on board as well. Of course, it is subject to investigation what really happened, but in terms of the sequence of events, what we know so far is that the window was just a few seconds after takeoff when the air traffic control lost contact with this aircraft following a May Day call that was made by the pilot and it just happened within a few seconds.

And Arunadeh, we're getting reports in the last short while that a doctor's hostel was struck by the plane as it came down. What more can you tell us about the impact on this civilian area in which the plane crashed? So that's that's all we know at the moment that this plane reportedly came down and hit a doctor's hostel in that particular area. We don't have any more details, we don't know how many people were in that building at that time, how big was that building, but what we need to ascertain is what kind of other buildings were there in the area, what kind of population was there, how heavily populated was it, usually around airports, you know, they try to keep it away from the city.

But this is also an area which is a residential area is what we're reporting as well. So I think that's something of great concern, which also complicates the relief and rescue efforts as well, and also maximizes the impact of this kind of a tragedy that we're seeing, which is why you're seeing the kind of urgency with which rescue teams are on the ground, the kind of statements that have come in right from big leaders of the state, including the leaders here in the federal government, right from Prime Minister Narendra Modi to the Civil Aviation Minister, who's currently en route to Gujarat. It's also difficult at the moment because the Ahmedabad airport has been shut down.

There are some smaller airports nearby so a lot of people are trying to get there, especially media teams who are trying to get to the spot to try and get first-hand information are also finding it a bit difficult to make their way to that spot from places like Delhi or Mumbai. But it is, as I said, it's a very, very difficult situation, which is why you're also seeing information coming in in bits and pieces. I would assume that there could be some sort of

an official statement that could come out after a few hours once they have a handle on what really the situation is on the ground, the scale of it, because as we've been reporting on the ground, the fire is still blazing there, and this has hit a residential building, which according to reports was a doctor's hostel then this is a larger, you know, the ambit of the tragedy becomes even wider involving a lot of personnel on the ground who have to work round the clock which is why you're also seeing

volunteers and locals on the ground sort of pitching in to try and help as the situation progresses. Well our reporter Roxy Gagder-Koor is at the scene of the Air India plane crash and gave us this update. You can hear the sound of the fire vehicles, this firefighting vehicles, they are constantly moving from one place to other. They are trying to go out of the fire since last two hours, but still the fire is going on. We saw some bulldozers being bought right now to remove the scrap so that the people who have died in this accident, their bodies can be taken out because with the help of this bulldozer, some walls freeze and other structure has fallen down because of this crash. Media is not allowed to go near the site right now, but when we reach here, we saw that after

the crash, the wing of the plane was on the road over here. We are at the one side of the runway. This is the Meghani Nagar area. It's a densely populated area. The site of the accident place, the place where plane crashed, even a multi-storey residential building is very near to the, to that place. The site of the accident right now is a place where the government officials, especially the medical staff were living. The entire area is very densely populated. It's when we talk to some people, there were some people living in huts near

the near the main gate of the campus. Even those people might have died. That's what the local residents fear. So, you know, the area is quite densely populated and the number of deaths because of this crash of the people living in the area is yet to be identified. Aviation expert Jeffrey Thomas gave us his initial thoughts about the crash. There's over 1,100 787s in service around the world. They've been flying for 11 years and just recently carried its one billionth passenger and up till today had a perfect safety record. Now to the Air India 787,

this was one of the first ones delivered, a 787-8. It took off, it was in the air for about a minute, but what disturbs me is that after takeoff the first thing that happens as soon as you have positive climb, you retract the undercarriage and then slowly as speed increases, you retract the flaps which are in a takeoff setting, which is different to the landing setting. It's a lesser flap setting. But when I'm looking at this vision of this 787 that's taken off and now sinking down into crash, the undercarriage is still down, but the flaps have been retracted.

Now, I'm just wondering whether, in fact, there was some possible error in the cockpit. I don't know. It's very unusual for the undercarriage still to be down a minute or two after takeoff. It's normally retracted within 10 to 15 seconds. And then the flaps are then retracted over a period of about 10 to 15 minutes.

So that's something I think the investigators would look at. Is it possible there was some confusion in the cockpit? Was it possible that the flaps were retracted and not the undercarriage? That happened in the United Kingdom. It's called Papa India. It's a BEA Trident at Heathrow Airport. The flaps were retracted and not the undercarriage, and it was a terrible tragedy back in the early 70s.

It has happened before. That would, to me, indicate... Because the plane simply sank. It didn't lurch from one side to the other, showing, you know, a possible mechanical problem, a, you know, control problem of some kind. It looked as though, for all intensive purposes, it was coming into land. It looked as though, for all intensive purposes, it was coming

into land. It appeared to be completely in control, just sank into the ground, and that would be a stall that was happening because there was not enough lift over the wings to sustain flight. This is an initial assessment from you, Geoffrey, based on what you've seen. It's very, very early days in all of this. Now, you mentioned right at the beginning of our conversation there are around 1,100 of these aircraft, this particular 787-8, in service around the world.

Up until now, it's had a perfect record. Yeah, look, there's three models. There's the 787-8 and there's about 400 of those. There's the 787-8 and there's about 400 of those. There's the 787-9 and there's about 700 of those. And there's a few hundred of the 787-10s. It's the same basic aeroplane, just different lengths. British Airways is a very big operator of them, Virgin Atlantics.

But there's about 80 operators of the aeroplane around the world. They operate essentially flawlessly. They did have some battery issues very early on. Everybody thinks the 787 is an amazing airplane. It's nicknamed the plastic fantastic and it's a magnificent airplane. That was aviation expert Geoffrey Thomas speaking to Anita McVeigh. Flight AI 171 from Ahmedabad was scheduled to land at Gatwick Airport this evening. Our reporter Sam Harrison is there.

That flight from Ahmedabad was due in here at 6.45 and it is a very popular route, a well-travelled route here to Gatwick. We know that over the past couple of years Gatwick has expanded its Indian operations going from 12 flights a week back in 2023 to now where they're operating around 19 flights a week from cities like Ahmedabad to here at Gatwick. We know that that popular demand is largely driven by the family ties that connect people from London and the rest of the UK over to India. So those flights are very popular. So of course the news coming out this morning is very shocking and we have spoken to Gatlin Airport this morning. As you can imagine

they are busily trying to wait as the rest of us are for any more updates on this. What we do know is that over 240 people were on board in total. That flight was due after 9 hours and 45 minutes to land here at Gatwick airport at around 6.45 this evening. Sam Harrison, our South Asia regional editor Ambarasan Etirajan, has been telling us more about the reaction in India. People were shocked and saddened by this incident. The Indian Prime Minister has issued a statement saying he was stunned and saddened by this incident and several other ministers have reacted in the same way and they also say that they are now trying to get in touch with the families to give them the information they want and they are trying to set up an emergency coordination team and the UK Prime Minister in the meantime he says that his

thoughts are with the passengers and families of those on the Air India flight. He says that the scenes emerging out of this incident they are devastating and I'm being kept updated as the situation develops. This is what Keir Starmer is saying. And now we're also trying to get more information about what really happened and where exactly it fell and now we understand that the plane crashed into one of the buildings was a doctor's hostel and there many of the family members are trying to find out how many managed to escape. So one

mother was saying that her son was on the second floor of the hostel but he jumped out and he was injured but he managed to survive. It was a very miraculous escape. So we are still getting more details about you know what's happening on the ground but still not clear how this incident happened. And as we speak Ambaras, our rescue and recovery operations are still very much ongoing but how much of a blow is this for Air India? It will be a huge blow for this company because it was taken over by Tata conglomerate in 2022. It was facing major losses

when it was the state run carrier for several years. And it is one of the biggest airlines in Asia. And even in recent times, there have been delays and also the company was going through another financial problem because of the India-Pakistan conflict. Pakistan closed airspace for Indian Airlines.

So the planes coming out of Delhi and from Northern India, they were taking a detour going all the way to Western India into the Arabian Sea before entering into Iran and coming all the way to Europe. So that means you add another an hour and a half that costed nearly the cost hundreds of millions of dollars, you know, if you calculate it for one full year. And so it is a huge blow, but it is also a very popular airline for Indians traveling abroad, not only to Europe and many people go all the way to the US. So London is a very, very convenient transit hub. I have traveled on Air India several times, in fact even last month. So now they've introduced new planes, they operate more than 200 aircraft,

dozens of destinations around the world and it's got tie-ups with many other airlines, alliances. So it will be seen as a huge blow for Air India. And also, they want to find out how this happened. But at the same time, the company now says they're trying to reach out to the families to give them the information and trying to gather as much detail as possible. That was Ambar Arsan at Irajan. And that's it from us for now.

But the regular edition of the Global News podcast later will have more information on the Air India crash. You will also be able to find the latest information on the BBC live page. This edition was mixed by Daniela Varela Hernandez. The producer was Vanessa Heaney. Our editor is Karen Martin. I'm Jackie Leonard and until next time, goodbye.