The sole survivor of the Air India crash on Thursday has broken his silence on his near-death escape.
Vishwash Kumar Ramesh, a 40-year-old British citizen from Leicester, was seated near the front of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner when it departed from Ahmedabad Airport in Gujarat, western India.
The flight was en route to London Gatwick.
Ramesh had been traveling with his brother, Ajay, who was seated elsewhere on the aircraft and tragically did not survive the crash.
The circumstances behind the crash remain unclear—as does the astonishing chain of events that allowed Ramesh to walk away with only relatively minor injuries.
A video of British national Vishwash Kumar Ramesh, believed to be the lone survivor of Air India flight 171, walking from the crash site and getting into an ambulance that took him to the hospital for medical care. May god bless him and aid in his long road of recovery. pic.twitter.com/nLNk8UIRjo
— SonnyBoy (@gotrice2024) June 12, 2025
In an exclusive interview with Indian television channel NDTV on Friday, Ramesh said he did not believe he would survive.
“Everything happened in front of my eyes. I thought I would die,” Ramesh told NDTV in an exclusive interview on Friday.
“The side where I was seated fell into the ground floor of the building.”
British crash survivor Vishwash Kumar Ramesh describes his escape from the Air India plane in Ahmedabad.
Everyone on the plane died, except for him.https://t.co/czOsM5ZWRp pic.twitter.com/Va9cfnaILe
— Sky News (@SkyNews) June 13, 2025
”There was some space. When the door broke, I saw that space and I just jumped out.”
“It all happened so quickly. When I got up, there were bodies all around me. I was scared. I stood up and ran. There were pieces of the plane all around me.
”Someone grabbed hold of me and put me in an ambulance and brought me to the hospital.”
Miracle Amid Tragedy: British National Believed to Be Sole Survivor of Air India Flight 171 Crash That Killed 241 — Walks Away with Just Scratches
All 241 other passengers on the flight were killed in the incident, which is believed to be the worst aviation disaster in the past decade.
Meanwhile, a further 24 people have died on the ground after the plane crashed into the BJ Medical College building.
Many others were injuried in and around the building and are currently receiving treatment at nearby hospitals.
Investigations into the cause of the incident are underway, with an exact cause yet to be identified.
Read the full article here