Air India Ahmedabad Crash: 119 Bodies Matched Through DNA Testing; Tata Chairman Calls It 'Most Heartbreaking Crisis'; US Agency Launches Probe

Ahmedabad Civil Hospital is conducting the DNA testing for the victims in the Air India plane crash where 270 lives were lost, and in the last four days they have been able to identify 119 victims through DNA matching and 76 bodies, including that of former Gujarat chief minister Vijay Rupani, have been handed over to their families.

Tata Sons and Air India Chairman N Chandrasekaran on Monday urged Air India employees to 'stay on course' in the wake of the crash as he termed the accident the most "heartbreaking" crisis of his career, PTI reported.

Along with Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau of India carrying out an investigation into the crash, the United States' National Transportation Safety Board has launched a parallel probe in the matter.

The Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner with 242 persons on board crashed into a medical college complex in Ahmedabad moments after taking off from the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International Airport at 1.39 pm on June 12.

While 241 persons on board the London-bound aircraft died, one passenger miraculously survived. The crash also killed 29 persons on the ground, including five MBBS students.

DNA Testing Results so Far

An official expressed hope that the DNA profiling all the victims will be completed by either Tuesday evening or Wednesday morning.

Authorities are carrying out DNA tests to establish the identity of the victims as many bodies were charred beyond recognition or damaged.

"Till Monday evening, 119 DNA samples have been matched, and 76 bodies have already been handed over to the respective families. These deceased were from different parts of Gujarat and Rajasthan," Medical Superintendent of Ahmedabad Civil Hospital Dr Rakesh Joshi told reporters.

He expressed hope that the DNA profiling all the victims will be completed by either Tuesday evening or Wednesday morning.

He urged the grief-stricken kin of the victims to not panic over the time-consuming process of matching DNA samples with mortal remains.

"We are trying our best to finish this process as soon as possible. Some are complaining that the results have not come even after 72 hours. I appeal to them not to panic because this is a very important process with legal implications. We will call them as soon as results arrive," Joshi asserted.

Ahmedabad Civil Hospital authorities had said on Sunday that samples of 250 victims, including persons on board the ill-fated flight as well as those killed on the ground, had been collected for identification.

Rupani was among the 242 passengers and crew members on board the London-bound Air India flight AI-171 that crashed in Ahmedabad on June 12. His mortal remains were handed over to his wife Anjali Rupani and other family members at the city civil hospital.

Tata Sons And Air India Chairman

According to nws agency PTI, Tata Sons and Air India Chairman N Chandrasekaran addressed close to 700 employees and the leadership team across the Air India headquarters and Air India Training Academy in Gurugram and asked them to show resilience and use this incident as an act of force to build a "safer airline".

"We have to make sure that we stay the course. Be more determined in everything we do. We need to wait for the investigation to find out," PTI quoted Chandrasekaran as saying.

"I've seen a reasonable number of crises in my career, but this is the most heartbreaking one which I never thought I would see," Chandrasekaran reportedly said.

Chandrasekaran reportedly visited the emergency command centre; the integrated operations command centre and the customer service and support.

"Whatever I say and whatever we do is not going to bring the lives back. Those affected, they're going to feel the pain for a very long time. But having said that, we have got to do our very best humanly possible to help each of them," he said in his address to the employees.

Stating that the airline is getting more determined, after the crash, he said, "It's not the time to talk about what we will do, but I want to say that we will consider all the people who lost someone as our family forever." Urging the employees to be "strong," he said. "We need to show resilience. We need to use this incident as an act of force to build a safer airline." "So we have to make sure that we stay the course. Be more determined in everything we do. We need to wait for the investigation to find out (the cause)," the Tata Sons chief said.

Chandrasekaran said that (aviation) business is a very complex one and the aircraft (itself) is a complex machine, "so (there are) a lot of redundancies, checks and balances, certifications, which have been perfected over years and years'¦Yet this happens, so we will figure out why it happens after the investigation." He said that everyone's job at Air India is to get the airline "into a better place, the place it deserves, the place this country deserves, the place where all the people who have trust in us deserve."

US Agency Launches Parallel Probe Into Ahmedabad Crash

The United States' National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) has launched a parallel probe into the Air India plane crash here, drawing several international experts to the accident site.

The Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) of India had earlier launched a detailed probe to get to the bottom of the cause of the deadly crash last week.

The NTSB is an independent federal agency of the US tasked with investigating every civil aviation accident. They determine the probable causes of accidents and events and investigate and issue safety recommendations aimed at preventing future occurrences.

According to PTI, teams from Boeing and Air India are also assisting agencies in the probe.