A plane carrying 190 passengers and crew slid off a runway Friday in heavy rain in Southern India.
Police said at least 16 people were killed and 123 injured, The Associated Press reported. At least 15 of the injured were in critical condition.
The pilot and co-pilot were among the dead, the Hindustan Times reported.
The Directorate General of Civil Aviation said in a statement that the plane landed in heavy rain and then continued "running to end of runway and fell down in the valley and broke down in two pieces," according to the Hindustan Times.
The 2-year-old Boeing 737-800 flown by Air India Express had taken off from Dubai and was attempting to land in Kozhikode. The incident happened about 7:30 p.m. Friday local time.
Thunderstorms with embedded heavy rain built up around the airport Friday evening, weather.com meteorologist Jonathan Belles said. Rainfall rates of 1-3 inches per hour fell in Kerala state at the time.
The AP reported that Amitabh Kant, head of the government's planning commission, said weather was a factor.
“The incident happened because of heavy rains and poor visibility," he told NDTV. "This is truly devastating."
He said the runway is challenging because it is on a hilltop with deep gorges on either side.
Mark Martin, a Dubai-based aviation consultant, told AP, “Low visibility, wet runway, low cloud base, all leading to very poor braking action is what looks like led to where we are at the moment with this crash.”
He called on the European Aviation Safety Agency and the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration to help with the Indian government's investigation.
Earlier in the day, a landslide triggered by torrential rains about 125 miles south of the airport killed at least 15 people.
The crashed plane was carrying 174 adult passengers, 10 infants, two pilots and four cabin crew, according to the AP.
The flight was returning Indian citizens who had been stranded abroad because of the coronavirus pandemic. Regular commercial flights are suspended.
The Weather Company’s primary journalistic mission is to report on breaking weather news, the environment and the importance of science to our lives. This story does not necessarily represent the position of our parent company, IBM.
The Weather Company’s primary journalistic mission is to report on breaking weather news, the environment and the importance of science to our lives. This story does not necessarily represent the position of our parent company, IBM.
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