Someone Somehow Survived That Massive Boeing Jet Explosion

On Thursday, a Boeing jet crashed just moments after taking off from an airport in Ahmedabad in western India. The Air India airliner, carrying 242 passengers, slammed into a nearby medical college and exploded in an enormous fireball.

Somehow, one man survived: 38-year-old Viswash Kumar Ramesh.

"I don't know how I am alive," Viswash said, according to his younger brother Nayan Ramesh, as quoted by the New York Times.

In a video widely shared on social media, the India-born British citizen can be seen limping away from the crash site and towards an ambulance, his shirt bloodied and with what appears to be ash clinging to his hair and clothes.

It's almost certain that everyone else onboard perished in the disastrous crash, including Viswash's brother Ajay. The siblings were returning to England after a vacation in India.

Ramesh echoed his disbelief in an interview from his hospital bed. "I still can't believe how I got out alive," he told Indian state-owned broadcaster DD News, as quoted by the NYT. "I thought I was also about to die."

Officials are still investigating the cause of the crash of Air India Flight 171, which could take months or even years to determine. One compelling piece of evidence so far is footage of the takeoff from several angles. As the airliner, a Boeing Dreamliner 787, rises from the runway, it can be seen losing lift, before eerily floating down to the streets below.

Data from the flight-tracking service Flightradar, which was shared in a tweet, indicates that the jet reached a maximum altitude of 625 feet — with the airport's altitude at about 200 feet — before plunging at a rate of 475 feet per minute.

Additional data from the aviation analytics firm Cirium cited by the NYT showed that the jet, which was delivered in January 2014, had racked up more than 41,000 flight hours, and had taken off or landed nearly 8,000 times over its career — which is typical for its class and age.

What this all means is unclear. Some experts have speculated that this could be a case of an extremely rare double engine failure, while others have disputed this explanation. It's far too early to know for sure, regardless.

Per the NYT, Ramesh recalled that the plane felt "stuck five or 10 seconds after takeoff," and that the pilot was trying to accelerate the aircraft. "But it was struggling," he said.

The sole survivor's seat.

AFP Infographic showing the seat plan for the Air India Boeing 787 Dreamliner locating where the sole survivor was seated on the June 12 flight AI171 pic.twitter.com/pp6GvIOP4G

— AFP News Agency (@AFP) June 13, 2025

Ramesh was sitting in seat 11A, a number which has already become immortalized online. After the crash, Ramesh said he unbuckled his seatbelt and looked for an exit, seeing that the right side was blocked off by the wall of a building, with passengers unable to escape. "I could see in front of my eyes the air hostesses and others — just everybody caught in it."

On the other side, "as soon as the door broke, I could see that it was open for me and I had a chance to get out," Ramesh said, adding that he burned his hand when the fire erupted.

The horrific tragedy will heighten the scrutiny on Boeing. This is the first crash that its 787 Dreamliner has been involved in since it was launched in 2011, but the company has been embroiled in scandal after two deadly crashes with its 737 MAX 8 in 2018 and 2019, killing 346 people. The scrutiny was renewed in early 2024, when a "door plug" on a Boeing 737 MAX 9 blew out midflight. Air India also has a history marred with deadly crashes, including one in 2010 that killed 158 people, and its most recent occurring in 2020, with 21 dead; in both, pilot error was implicated.

More on: Boeing Jet Explodes in Giant Fireball, Killing Hundreds

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