Kerala, India — An Air India plane skids off the runway and crashes in the airport of Kerala.
The plane was an Air India Express plane. It crashed at the South Indian state of Kerala when the plane skidded off the runway and broke into half while landing at Kozhikode Calicut International Airport.
The crash caused a minimum of 18 deaths including the death of both of the pilots, according to Rajeev Jain, a senior media officer for the Ministry of Aviation. The Central Industrial Security Force’s Inspector General, CV Anand informed that 46 other people were seriously injured as well.
The Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri told CNN that the fight, number IX-1344 overshot the runway in rainy conditions, “went down 35-feet into a slope before breaking up into two pieces.”
The flight, also known as Calicut was a repatriation flight from Dubai to Kozhikode. According to Air India Express, the plane had 190 people on board.
“There are 174 passengers, 10 infants, 2 pilots, 4 cabin crew on board the aircraft,” the statement said, adding that “no fire reported at the time of landing.” The airline added that the flight’s four crew members were “confirmed safe.”
Images taken from the scene show a crowd of people searching through the debris of broken fuselage with pieces of the plane scattered across what appears to be the field.
Friday’s crash comes after a decade after the last Indian plan overshot a runway in the southern Indian city of Mangalore. The plane had crashed into a ravine and burst into flames, killing over 158 people.
