{"id":116478,"date":"2025-11-03T23:56:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-03T23:56:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/116478\/"},"modified":"2025-11-03T23:56:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-03T23:56:08","slug":"sole-survivor-of-air-india-crash-speaks-of-trauma","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/116478\/","title":{"rendered":"Sole survivor of Air India crash speaks of trauma"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  [&amp;_p]:tit-sub-xl tit-sub-xl md:[&amp;_p]:d-tit-sub-xl md:d-tit-sub-xl mb-[1.3rem]\">The lone survivor of the Air India crash that killed 241 people earlier this year has described the trauma of losing his brother in the disaster. <\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">Viswashkumar Ramesh was headed to London when the flight crashed minutes after taking off from India&#8217;s northwestern city of Ahmedabad on June 12. <\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">His story gained international attention after he was videoed walking away from one of India&#8217;s worst aviation disasters, and the first crash for a Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner. <\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">Speaking to the BBC, the 39-year-old said he was suffering emotionally and physically after the ordeal. <\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.tvnz.co.nz\/news\/news-clips-str-34ysyuer491tv8zffqjrqptky2o-1762190062807\/miracle-sole-survivor-of-air-india-plane-crash-reveals-his-trauma-in-depth\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Miracle sole survivor of Air India plane crash reveals his trauma &#8211; watch on TVNZ+<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">&#8220;I&#8217;m only one survivor. Still, I&#8217;m not believing. It&#8217;s a miracle,&#8221; he said. <\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">&#8220;I lost my brother as well. My brother is my backbone. Last few years, he was always supporting me.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">Ramesh was diagnosed with post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) after returning to his home in Leicester. <\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">Asked how he was doing, he said: &#8220;Still not good&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">&#8220;It is very painful for me to explain [what] happened, still. I can&#8217;t say anything more than that,&#8221; he said. <\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">Ramesh said he was the &#8220;luckiest man&#8221;, but losing his brother meant he had &#8220;lost everything&#8221;. <\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">At the time of the crash, Ramesh &#8211; who was seated in 11A &#8211; said his side of the plane fell onto the ground floor of a building, and there was space for him to escape after the door broke open. He unfastened his seat belt and forced himself out of the plane.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">&#8220;When I opened my eyes, I realised I was alive,&#8221; he said from his hospital bed in June. <\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">Ramesh sustained burn injuries on his left hand and walked some distance in shock before he was assisted by the locals and taken to the hospital in an ambulance.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">The plane was carrying 230 passengers \u2014 169 Indians, 53 British, seven Portuguese and a Canadian \u2014 along with 12 crew members.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">Nineteen people were killed on the ground. <\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">A preliminary investigation report released in July said fuel control switches for the engines of an Air India flight were moved from the &#8220;run&#8221; to the &#8220;cutoff&#8221; position moments before impact, starving both engines of fuel. <\/p>\n<p class=\"body-paragraph articleLinkText  lg mb-4\">The report, issued by India\u2019s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau, also indicated that both pilots were confused over the change to the switch setting, which caused a loss of engine thrust shortly after takeoff.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text-greyDarkFaded\">The morning&#8217;s headlines in 90 seconds, including a kiwi mum pleads for help after a firebomb attack, the NZ hopes at the Melbourne Cup, and a notorious pitch invader strikes again.  (Source: Breakfast)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The lone survivor of the Air India crash that killed 241 people earlier this year has described the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":116479,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1081,2300,42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-116478","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-accident","9":"tag-asia","10":"tag-headlines","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-top-news","13":"tag-top-stories","14":"tag-topnews","15":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/116478","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=116478"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/116478\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/116479"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=116478"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=116478"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=116478"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}