Kozhikode Air India Express plane crash: One of the dead passengers in plane crash resulted Corona positive

Kozhikode Air India Express plane crash: One of the 18 passengers, who died in the Air India Express plane crash in Kozhikode, has tested positive for the Novel Coronavirus. The passenger was returning from Dubai on the Vande Bharat repatriation mission flight on Friday night.

The Air India Express flight carrying 190 people onboard overshot the runway in the heavy rainfall and tumbled 35 feet down the tabletop on which the airport is located.

The aircraft broke into two pieces following the crash. Two pilots and 16 passengers were dead in the incident. Over 100 passengers are suffering with severe injuries in the crash and are currently admitted at various hospitals. 22 of them are in critical condition.

The pilot of the flight "IX-1344" could not sight the runway in the first landing attempt due to heavy rains. The Kozhikode airport in Kerala has a table-top runway and is operated by the Airports Authority of India (AAI). Generally, table-top runways are constructed on a hilly or an elevated terrain.

An AAI spokesperson said that runway 28 was in use and in the first landing attempt, the pilot could not sight the runway and requested for runway 10. Citing information from the Air Traffic Controller (ATC), the spokesperson said the aircraft touched down near taxiway 'C', which is approximately 1,000 metres from the beginning of runway 10. The total length of the runway is 2,700 metres.

Rescue operations were completed around midnight and airport operations resumed at 3 am on Saturday morning. The Boeing 737-800 aircraft while landing overshot the runway and went down 35 feet into a slope before breaking up into two pieces.