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Grieving families are mourning at least 279 killed when a London-bound passenger jet crashed in India, with the victims in Ahmedabad ranging from a top politician to a teenage tea seller.One man on board the plane, which was carrying 242 passengers and crew, miraculously survived the fiery crash on Thursday afternoon.But that lone British citizen was the only story of escape from the jet.”I saw my child for the first time in two years, it was a great time,” said Anil Patel, whose son and daughter-in-law had surprised him with a visit from Britain.”And now, there is nothing,” he said, breaking down in tears. “Whatever the gods wanted has happened.”Air India said there were 169 Indian passengers, 53 British, seven Portuguese and a Canadian on board the flight bound for London’s Gatwick airport, as well as 12 crew members.At least 38 people were killed on the ground.The nose and front wheel of the Air India Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner landed on a canteen building where medical students were having lunch.Mohit Chavda, 25, a junior doctor in Ahmedabad, described how he escaped through choking black smoke after the plane smashed into the dining hall.”There was almost zero visibility,” Chavda said. “We were not able to see even who was sitting beside us — so we just ran from there.”Scorch marks scar the buildings, where chunks of the plane were embedded into its walls. – ‘He caught fire’ -Among the dead was Vijay Rupani, 68, a senior member of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ruling party and former chief minister of Gujarat state.But they also included teenager Akash Patni, who Indian media reported had been snoozing under a tree in the fierce heat of the day near his family’s tea stall in Ahmedabad.”He caught fire in front of my eyes,” his mother Kalpesh Patni said, weeping as she talked to the Indian Express newspaper. “I won’t be able to live without him.”Businessman Suresh Mistry, 53, said his daughter Kinal was a trained dancer, an excellent cook and a yoga enthusiast. A chef in London, she had been visiting her family in India and postponed her flight to stay a few more days.Mistry described the last time he spoke to her, when she called to say the plane was about to take off and he could head back home without any worry.He said he couldn’t stop thinking about how, if she had stuck to her original plan, “she would have been alive”. 

Grieving families waited Saturday for news after one of the deadliest air disasters in decades, with the toll rising to 279 people killed in the Indian passenger jet crash.The Air India Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner issued a mayday call shortly before it crashed around lunchtime on Thursday, bursting into a fireball as it hit residential buildings.On Saturday, a police source said that 279 bodies had been recovered from the crash site in the northern Indian city of Ahmedabad, one of the worst plane disasters of the 21st century.There was one survivor out of 242 passengers and crew on board the jet when it crashed, leaving the tailpiece of the aircraft jutting out of a hostel for medical staff.At least 38 people were killed on the ground.”I saw my child for the first time in two years, it was a great time,” said Anil Patel, whose son and daughter-in-law had surprised him with a visit before boarding the Air India flight.”And now, there is nothing,” he said, breaking down in tears. “Whatever the gods wanted has happened.”- Search for black box -Distraught relatives of passengers have been providing DNA samples in Ahmedabad, with some having to fly to India to help the process.The official casualty number will not be finalised until the slow process of DNA identification is completed.Air India said there were 169 Indian passengers, 53 British, seven Portuguese and a Canadian on board the flight, as well as 12 crew members.Those killed ranged from a top politician to a teenage tea seller.The lone survivor, Vishwash Kumar Ramesh, 40, said even he could not explain how he survived.”Initially, I too thought that I was about to die, but then I opened my eyes and realised that I was still alive,” Ramesh, a British citizen, told national broadcaster DD News from his hospital bed.Aviation Minister Ram Mohan Naidu Kinjarapu said Friday that a flight data recorder, or black box, had been recovered, saying it would “significantly aid” investigations.Forensic teams are still looking for the second black box, as they probe why the plane crashed after lifting barely 100 metres (330 feet) from the ground.US planemaker Boeing said it was in touch with Air India and stood “ready to support them” over the incident, which a source close to the case said was the first crash for a 787 Dreamliner.

The UK-based family of the lone survivor of the Air India crash were torn on Friday between joy at his miracle escape and grief at the loss of his brother.”We are happy Vishwash has been saved, but on the other hand we are just heartbroken about Ajay,” his cousin told AFP outside the family home in central Leicester.Vishwash Kumar Ramesh, 40, is believed to be the only person to have survived the crash when Air India Flight 171 plummeted from the sky shortly after taking off from the northern Indian city of Ahmedabad.His brother, Ajay Kumar Ramesh, was on the same flight, but is believed to have perished in the disaster. There were 242 passengers and crew on the plane, including 53 British citizens.At least 24 people were killed on the ground, officials said, after the aeroplane landed on a canteen building where students were having lunch.Since Thursday’s tragedy, the small Leicester street where Ramesh’s parents and younger brother lived has been flooded with visitors.Ramesh lives not far away with his wife and son, his cousin Hiren Kantilal, 19, told AFP.Ajay also lived in the town, one of the oldest in England, and the two brothers ran a confectionary business together.”They are wonderful people, and heartful people. They are greatest men I have ever seen in my life, both of them,” said Kantilal.The brothers were returning to the UK after spending a few weeks on holiday in India, and the family had been waiting to go and pick them up at Gatwick airport.- ‘I am totally fine’ -Shortly after the crash, they were shocked when Ramesh, who had reportedly been in seat 11A, called his father to say he was alive. Ajay was seated at the other end of the row.”Our plane has been crashed,” Ramesh told his dad, according to his cousin.”He was bleeding all over him, in the face and everything, and he said: ‘I am just waiting for my brother and I don’t know how I get out of the plane’.”He said: ‘do not worry about me, try to find about Ajay Kumar’ and he said: ‘I am totally fine’.”Kantilal said his cousin had waited for about 10 to 15 minutes seeking his brother, and then was whisked away to hospital by the rescue services.Images which went viral on social media apparently showed Ramesh walking away from the wreckage of the 787-8 Boeing Dreamliner, and have been splashed across the front pages of British media along with a photo of him in his hospital bed.Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi paid a visit to Ramesh on Friday at the hospital where he is being treated for burns and other injuries, footage on his YouTube channel showed.”Everything happened in front of me, and even I couldn’t believe how I managed to come out alive from that,” Ramesh said from his hospital bed, speaking in Hindi to national broadcaster DD News.His parents had also been desperately trying to contact his brother Ajay on Thursday. “The call was going through, but no-one was answering the call,” Kantilal said.At the family home, relatives were frantically scanning their phones to try to buy a flight to Ahmedabad later on Friday afternoon.Downing Street said that the foreign ministry had been in touch with Ramesh to offer him consular assistance.

Investigators recovered a black box recorder on Friday from the crash site of a London-bound passenger jet that ploughed into a residential area of India’s Ahmedabad city, killing at least 265 people on board and on the ground.The Air India Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner issued a mayday call shortly before it crashed around lunchtime on Thursday after lifting barely 100 metres (330 feet) from the ground.One man on board the plane, which was carrying 242 passengers and crew, miraculously survived the fiery crash, which left the tailpiece of the aircraft jutting out of the second floor of a hostel for medical staff from a nearby hospital.”Initially, I too thought that I was about to die, but then I opened my eyes and realised that I was still alive,” survivor Vishwash Kumar Ramesh, a British citizen, told national broadcaster DD News from his hospital bed.The nose and front wheel of Air India flight 171 landed on a canteen building where students were having lunch, witnesses said.Deputy Commissioner of Police Kanan Desai said 265 bodies had been counted so far, which suggested that at least 24 people were killed on the ground. The toll could rise further as more body parts are recovered.”The official number of deceased will be declared only after DNA testing is completed”, Home Minister Amit Shah said in a statement late on Thursday. DNA samples will be taken from family members of the dead who live abroad, he said.Air India said there were 169 Indian passengers, 53 British, seven Portuguese and a Canadian on board the flight bound for London’s Gatwick airport, as well as 12 crew members.Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited the devastated neighbourhood on Friday and was also pictured by survivor Ramesh’s bedside.Ramesh, who suffered burns and other injuries, said: “Everything happened in front of me, and even I couldn’t believe how I managed to come out alive from that.””Within a minute after takeoff, suddenly… it felt like something got stuck… I realised something had happened, and then suddenly the plane’s green and white lights turned on.”Aviation Minister Ram Mohan Naidu Kinjarapu said that a flight data recorder, or black box, had been recovered, saying it would “significantly aid” investigations.- ‘Last call’ -In Ahmedabad, disconsolate relatives of passengers gathered at an emergency centre on Friday to give DNA samples so their loved ones could be identified.Ashfaque Nanabawa, 40, said he had come to find his cousin Akeel Nanabawa, who had been aboard with his wife and three-year-old daughter. They had spoken as his cousin sat in the plane before takeoff.”He called us and he said: ‘I am in the plane and I have boarded safely and everything was okay’. That was his last call.”One woman, too grief-stricken to give her name, said her son-in-law had been killed.”My daughter doesn’t know that he’s no more”, she said, wiping away tears. “I can’t break the news to her, can someone else do that please?” Volunteer rescuers described seeing “bodies everywhere”.”The bodies were totally burnt. It was like coal,” said Bharat Solanki, 51, who was working at a nearby fuel station and rushed to the site with a couple of friends. Ahmedabad, the main city in India’s Gujarat state, is home to around eight million people and its busy airport is surrounded by densely packed residential areas.”One half of the plane crashed into the residential building where doctors lived with their families,” said Krishna, a doctor who did not give his full name.US planemaker Boeing said it was in touch with Air India and stood “ready to support them” over the incident, which a source close to the case said was the first crash for a 787 Dreamliner.India’s aviation authorities ordered Air India on Friday to “carry out additional maintenance actions” on its fleet of Boeing 787-8/9 Dreamliners equipped with GEnx engines.The carrier has 34 Dreamliners, although it was not immediately clear how many have the advanced GEnx engines.UK and US air accident investigation agencies are sending teams to support their Indian counterparts.- Rapid growth -India has suffered a series of fatal air crashes, including a 1996 disaster when two jets collided mid-air over New Delhi, killing nearly 350 people.In 2010, an Air India Express jet crashed and burst into flames at Mangalore airport in southwest India, killing 158 of the 166 passengers and crew on board.Experts said it was too early to speculate on what may have caused Thursday’s crash.”The aircraft is designed to be able to fly on one engine, so the most likely cause of the crash is a double engine failure,” said Jason Knight, senior lecturer in fluid mechanics at the University of Portsmouth.”The most likely cause of a double engine failure is a bird strike.”India’s airline industry has boomed in recent years.The growth of its economy has made India and its 1.4 billion people the world’s fourth-largest air market — domestic and international — with the International Air Transport Association projecting it will become the third biggest within the decade.

The lone survivor of 242 people aboard a London-bound passenger plane that crashed in the Indian city of Ahmedabad said Friday how even he was struggling to explain how he miraculously walked out alive from the fireball explosion.”Everything happened in front of me, and even I couldn’t believe how I managed to come out alive from that,” British citizen Vishwash Kumar Ramesh said from his hospital bed on Friday, speaking in Hindi to national broadcaster DD News.The Air India Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner plane, which was full of fuel as it took off for a long-haul flight to London, exploded into a burst of orange flame on Thursday afternoon just after taking off. Ramesh — who was in seat 11A according to media reports — was the only one aboard the plane not to be killed, with at least 24 others killed on the ground.His brother was also on the same flight, his family in Britain told reporters.”Within a minute after takeoff, suddenly… it felt like something got stuck… I realised something had happened, and then suddenly the plane’s green and white lights turned on,” Ramesh said.”After that, the plane seemed to speed up, heading straight towards what turned out to be a hostel of a hospital. Everything was visible in front of my eyes when the crash happened.”Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi paid a visit to Ramesh on Friday at the hospital where he is being treated for burns and other injuries, footage on his YouTube channel showed.- ‘About to die’ -Ramesh, aged 40, is from the British city of Leicester, according to Britain’s Press Association news agency, which spoke with his family at home.The plane smashed into the buildings just outside the perimeter of the airport.”Initially, I too thought that I was about to die, but then I opened my eyes and realised that I was still alive,” he said.”I saw the air hostess and aunties and uncles all in front of me,” he said, his voice trailing off in emotion, using a term of respect used in India for older people.”I unfastened my seatbelt and tried to escape, and I did,” he said. “I think the side I was on was not facing the hostel,” he added. “Where I landed was closer to the ground and there was space too – and when my door broke — I saw that there was space, and I thought I could try to slip out.”Videos shared on social media showed Ramesh soon after, dressed in a bloodied t-shirt and limping, but walking towards an ambulance.”My left hand got slightly burnt due to the fire, but an ambulance brought me to the hospital,” he said. “The people here are taking good care of me.”Air India said there were 169 Indian passengers, 53 British, seven Portuguese, and a Canadian on board the flight bound for London’s Gatwick airport, as well as 12 crew members.The death toll currently stands at 265, police said.Authorities have set up DNA testing for relatives of passengers and those killed on the ground to identify the scorched bodies and body parts.

Volunteers who rushed to help after a passenger jet crashed into a residential neighbourhood of India’s Ahmedabad city described Friday the intense fireball they faced — and the challenge ahead to identify the bodies of at least 265 victims.Bharat Solanki, 51, was working at a fuel station when the Air India Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner — carrying 242 passengers and crew — took off from nearby Ahmedabad airport around lunchtime on Thursday.Less than a minute later it ploughed into a residential area, bursting into searing flames with what residents described as an ear-splitting blast.All but one aboard the plane was killed, and at least 24 others died on the ground.Solanki and a couple of friends rushed to the site.”We saw bodies everywhere — they were in pieces, fully burnt,” he said, recalling the horror of the scene.”We took out dead bodies”, he said, adding that he also helped bring out those injured from the medical hostel and nearby buildings that the plane smashed into.”Everywhere just bodies, parts, body parts. The bodies were totally burnt. It was like coal.”- ‘Didn’t get a chance’ -Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who visited the crash site on Friday morning, called it a “scene of devastation”.He was seen peering up at a fire-blackened multi-storey building with the plane’s wheels and tail embedded in a wall.Authorities have set up DNA testing for relatives of passengers and those killed on the ground to identify the scorched bodies and body parts.It may be weeks before a final death toll is confirmed. Home Minister Amit Shah, speaking after visiting the crash site on Thursday, said the plane was carrying 125,000 litres (27,500 gallons) of fuel.The “temperature was so high that one didn’t get a chance”, he said.Air India said there were 169 Indian passengers, 53 British, seven Portuguese, and a Canadian on board the flight bound for London’s Gatwick airport, as well as 12 crew members.Sona Prakash, who was close to the residential blocks of the medical accommodation, described how the “hostel was destroyed”, adding that “so many doctors were injured, so many died”.Another witness, 35-year-old labourer Patani, who uses only one name, said those around him thought a bomb had gone off before they realised it was a plane crash.”There was black smoke everywhere, plumes of smoke”, added Vinod Bhai, another labourer.”The sky was only black, that’s how much smoke was there.”Forensic teams are searching for the black box flight recorders that will detail the last moments of the flight for crash investigators.

In a sawdust-filled workshop nestled in the Karakoram Mountains, a team of women carpenters chisel away at cabinets — and forge an unlikely career for themselves in Pakistan. Women make up just a fraction of Pakistan’s formal workforce. But in a collection of villages sprinkled along the old Silk Road between China and Afghanistan, a group of women-led businesses is defying expectations.”We have 22 employees and have trained around 100 women,” said Bibi Amina, who launched her carpentry workshop in 2008 at the age of 30.Hunza Valley’s population of around 50,000, spread across mountains abounding with apricot, cherry, walnut and mulberry orchards, follow the Ismaili branch of Shiite Islam. Ismailis are led by the Aga Khan, a hereditary position held by a family with Pakistani roots now living in Europe.The family opened agirls’ school in Hunza in 1946, kickstarting an educational investment that pushed the valley’s literacy rate to 97 percent for both men and women. That rate far outstrips the country average of around 68 percent for men and 52.8 percent for women.As a result, attitudes have shifted, and women like Amina are taking expanded roles.”People thought women were there to wash dishes and do laundry,” Amina said of the generation before her. Trained by the Aga Khan Foundation to help renovate the ancient Altit Fort, Amina later used her skills to start her own business. Her carpenters are currently at work on a commission from a luxury hotel.- Pioneers -Only 23 percent of the women in Pakistan were officially part of the labour force as of 2024, according to data from the World Bank.In rural areas, women rarely take on formal employment but often toil in the fields to support the family’s farming income.In a Gallup poll published last year, a third of women respondents said their father or husband forbade them from taking a job, while 43.5 percent said they had given up work to devote themselves to domestic tasks. Cafe owner Lal Shehzadi spearheaded women’s restaurant entrepreneurship in Hunza.She opened her cafe at the top of a winding high street to supplement her husband’s small army pension.Sixteen years later, her simple set-up overlooking the valley has become a popular night-time tourist attraction. She serves visitors traditional cuisine, including yak meat, apricot oil and rich mountain cheese.”At the start, I used to work alone,” she said. “Now, 11 people work here and most of them are women. And my children are also working here.”Following in Shehzadi’s footsteps, Safina quit her job to start her own restaurant around a decade ago.”No one wanted to help me,” she said. Eventually, she convinced family members to sell two cows and a few goats for the money she needed to launch her business. Now, she earns the equivalent of around $170 a month, more than 15 times her previous income. – Farming to football -The socio-economic progress of women in Hunza compared to other rural areas of Pakistan has been driven by three factors, according to Sultan Madan, the head of the Karakoram Area Development Organisation and a local historian. “The main reason is the very high literacy rate,” he told AFP, largely crediting the Aga Khan Foundation for funding training programmes for women. “Secondly, agriculture was the backbone of the economy in the region, but in Hunza the landholding was meagre and that was why women had to work in other sectors.”Women’s increased economic participation has spilled into other areas of life, like sports fields. “Every village in the valley has a women’s soccer team: Gojal, Gulmit, Passu, Khyber, Shimsal,” said Nadia Shams, 17.On a synthetic pitch, she trains with her teammates in jogging pants or shorts, forbidden elsewhere by Pakistan’s dress code.  Here, one name is on everyone’s lips: Malika-e-Noor, the former vice-captain of the national team who scored the winning penalty against the Maldives in the 2010 South Asian Women’s Football Championship. Fahima Qayyum was six years old when she witnessed the killer kick.Today, after several international matches, she is recruiting the next generation.”As a girl, I stress to others the importance of playing, as sport is very good for health,” she told AFP.”If they play well, they can also get scholarships.”

Rescue teams with sniffer dogs combed the crash site Friday of a London-bound passenger jet which ploughed into a residential area of India’s Ahmedabad city, killing at least 265 people on board and on the ground.One man aboard the Air India Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner — carrying 242 passengers and crew — miraculously survived Thursday’s fiery crash, which left the tailpiece of the aircraft jutting out of the second floor of a hostel for medical staff from a nearby hospital.The nose and front wheel landed on a canteen building where students were having lunch, witnesses said.Deputy Commissioner of Police Kanan Desai said that 265 bodies had so far been counted — suggesting at least 24 people died on the ground — but the toll may rise as more body parts are recovered.”The official number of deceased will be declared only after DNA testing is completed”, Home Minister Amit Shah said in a statement late Thursday, adding that “families whose relatives are abroad have already been informed, and their DNA samples will be taken”. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who on Friday visited the devastated neighbourhood where Air India flight 171 went down, earlier described the crash as “heartbreaking beyond words”.The airline said there were 169 Indian passengers, 53 British, seven Portuguese, and a Canadian on board the flight bound for London’s Gatwick airport, as well as 12 crew members.Air India said the sole survivor from the plane — a British national of Indian origin who local media named as Vishwash Kumar Ramesh — was being treated in hospital.”He said, ‘I have no idea how I exited the plane'”, his brother Nayan Kumar Ramesh, 27, told Britain’s Press Association in Leicester.- ‘Last call -In Ahmedabad, disconsolate relatives of passengers gathered Friday at an emergency centre to give DNA samples so their loved ones could be identified.Ashfaque Nanabawa, 40, said he had come to find his cousin Akeel Nanabawa, who had been aboard with his wife and three-year-old daughter. They had spoken as his cousin sat in the plane, just before takeoff.”He called us and he said: ‘I am in the plane and I have boarded safely and everything was okay’. That was his last call.”One woman, too grief-stricken to give her name, said her son-in-law had been killed.”My daughter doesn’t know that he’s no more”, she said, wiping away tears. “I can’t break the news to her, can someone else do that please?” The plane crashed less than a minute after takeoff, around lunchtime Thursday, after lifting barely 100 metres from the ground.The plane issued a mayday call and “crashed immediately after takeoff”, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation said.Ahmedabad, the main city in India’s Gujarat state, is home to around eight million people and its busy airport is surrounded by densely packed residential areas.”One half of the plane crashed into the residential building where doctors lived with their families,” said Krishna, a doctor who did not give his full name.US planemaker Boeing said it was in touch with Air India and stood “ready to support them” over the incident, which a source close to the case said was the first crash for a 787 Dreamliner.The UK and US air accident investigation agencies announced they were dispatching teams to support their Indian counterparts.Tata Group, owners of Air India, offered financial aid of 10 million rupees ($117,000) to “the families of each person who has lost their life in this tragedy”, as well as funds to cover medical expenses of those injured.- Rapid growth -India has suffered a series of fatal air crashes, including a 1996 disaster when two jets collided mid-air over New Delhi, killing nearly 350 people.In 2010, an Air India Express jet crashed and burst into flames at Mangalore airport in southwest India, killing 158 of the 166 passengers and crew on board.Experts said it was too early to speculate on what may have caused Thursday’s crash.”It is very unlikely that the plane was overweight or carrying too much fuel,” said Jason Knight, senior lecturer in fluid mechanics at the University of Portsmouth.”The aircraft is designed to be able to fly on one engine, so the most likely cause of the crash is a double engine failure. The most likely cause of a double engine failure is a bird strike.”India’s airline industry has boomed in recent years with Willie Walsh, director general of the International Air Transport Association (IATA), last month calling it “nothing short of phenomenal”.The growth of its economy has made India and its 1.4 billion people the world’s fourth-largest air market — domestic and international — with IATA projecting it will become the third biggest within the decade.

A London-bound passenger jet crashed in a residential area in the Indian city of Ahmedabad on Thursday, killing at least 265 people on board and on the ground — but one passenger has miraculously survived.An AFP journalist saw bodies being recovered from the crash site, and the back of the Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner — which had 242 passengers and crew on board — hanging over the edge of a building it hit around lunchtime.The government opened a formal investigation into the cause of the crash, and rescue teams worked into Friday morning scouring the charred wreckage with sniffer dogs.”The tragedy in Ahmedabad has stunned and saddened us,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi said after Air India’s flight 171 crashed following takeoff. “It is heartbreaking beyond words”.Deputy Commissioner of Police Kanan Desai told reporters said that “265 bodies have reached the hospital”.That suggests that at least 24 people died when the jet ploughed into a medical staff hostel in a blazing fireball — and that the toll may rise further as more bodies are located.- ‘Devastating’ -The AFP journalist saw a building ablaze after the crash, with thick black smoke billowing into the air, and a section of the plane on the ground.”One half of the plane crashed into the residential building where doctors lived with their families,” said Krishna, a doctor who did not give his full name.”The nose and front wheel landed on the canteen building where students were having lunch,” he said.Krishna said he saw “about 15 to 20 burnt bodies”, while he and his colleagues rescued around 15 students.India’s civil aviation authority said two pilots and 10 cabin crew were among the 242 people on board.Air India said there were 169 Indian passengers, 53 British, seven Portuguese, and a Canadian on board the flight bound for London’s Gatwick airport.UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the scenes from the crash were “devastating”, while the country’s King Charles III said he was “desperately shocked”.- ‘Sole survivor’ -But while everyone aboard the flight was initially feared killed, state health official Dhananjay Dwivedi told AFP “one survivor is confirmed” and had been hospitalised.Air India said in a statement that the “sole survivor is being treated in a hospital”, adding that the “survivor is a British national of Indian origin”.The survivor is believed to be 40-year-old Vishwash Kumar Ramesh. India’s Home Minister Amit Shah told reporters he was speaking to them “after meeting him”.The BBC and Britain’s Press Association news agency spoke to Ramesh’s family members.”He said, ‘I have no idea how I exited the plane'”, his brother Nayan Kumar Ramesh, 27, told PA in the British city of Leicester.- ‘Devastating’ -The plane issued a mayday call and “crashed immediately after takeoff”, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation said.Ahmedabad, the main city of India’s Gujarat state, is home to around eight million people and the busy airport is surrounded by densely packed residential areas.”When we reached the spot, there were several bodies lying around and firefighters were dousing the flames,” resident Poonam Patni told AFP.”Many of the bodies were burned,” she said.The AFP journalist saw medics using a cart to load bodies into an ambulance, while a charred metal bed frame stood surrounded by burnt wreckage.US planemaker Boeing said it was in touch with Air India and stood “ready to support them” over the incident, which a source close to the case said was the first crash for a 787 Dreamliner.The UK and US air accident investigation agencies announced they were dispatching teams to support their Indian counterparts.Tata Group, owners of Air India, offered financial aid of 10 million rupees ($117,000) to “the families of each person who has lost their life in this tragedy”, as well as funds to cover medical expenses of those injured.India has suffered a series of fatal air crashes, including a 1996 disaster when two jets collided mid-air over New Delhi, killing nearly 350 people.In 2010, an Air India Express jet crashed and burst into flames at Mangalore airport in southwest India, killing 158 of the 166 passengers and crew on board.Experts said it was too early to speculate on what may have caused Thursday’s crash.”It is very unlikely that the plane was overweight or carrying too much fuel,” said Jason Knight, senior lecturer in fluid mechanics at the University of Portsmouth.”The aircraft is designed to be able to fly on one engine, so the most likely cause of the crash is a double engine failure. The most likely cause of a double engine failure is a bird strike.”India’s airline industry has boomed in recent years with Willie Walsh, director general of the International Air Transport Association (IATA), last month calling it “nothing short of phenomenal”.The growth of its economy has made India and its 1.4 billion people the world’s fourth-largest air market — domestic and international — with IATA projecting it will become the third biggest within the decade.