Speaking from his hospital bed, the 40-year-old told Indian media that he was a British national and was travelling to Britain with his brother after visiting family in India.
“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,” Viswashkumar told the Hindustan Times.
“Thirty seconds after take-off, there was a loud noise and then the plane crashed,” he shared.
Social media footage shown on Indian news channels showed a man in a bloodstained white t-shirt and dark pants limping on a street and being helped by a medic. The man had bruises on his face and a goatee beard, resembling photographs of Viswashkumar in hospital after the crash that were published by local media.
More than 290 people were killed when the Air India plane bound for London with 242 people on board crashed minutes after taking off. It is the world’s worst aviation disaster in a decade.
The dead included people on the ground as the aircraft – headed for Gatwick Airport, south of the British capital – crashed on to a medical college hostel during lunch hour.
“Approximately 294 have died. This includes some students as the plane crashed on the building where they were staying,” Vidhi Chaudhary, a top state police officer, told Reuters.
