NEW DELHI –
An Air India plane headed to London with 242 people on board crashed minutes after taking off from India’s western city of Ahmedabad on Thursday, with India’s federal health minister saying “many people” had been killed.
Flight AI171 was headed to Gatwick airport in the U.K., Air India said. Police officers said it crashed in a civilian area near the airport.
“The building on which it has crashed is a doctors’ hostel … We have cleared almost 70% to 80% of the area and will clear the rest soon,” a senior police officer told reporters. At least 30 bodies have been recovered from a building at the site of the crash, rescue personnel said, adding that more people were trapped inside.
