(Adnkronos) – An Air India plane bound for London with 242 passengers and crew members on board crashed shortly after takeoff from Ahmedabad airport in northwestern India. Indian Aviation Minister Ram Mohan Naidu Kinjarapu said he was “shocked and devastated” and offered his “thoughts and prayers to the passengers on board and their families”.
“Emergency services have been mobilized and every effort is being made to ensure that medical teams are dispatched quickly to the scene,” Kinjarapu said in a statement.
Thick black smoke rose above the city’s airport, an AFP journalist said. The last plane crash in the country dates back to 2010, when an Air India plane from Dubai crashed on landing in Mangalore, southern India, killing 158 people. Eight others managed to escape.
Among the passengers are Indian, British, Portuguese, and one Canadian citizen, the airline later announced.
