More than 200 victims of the Air India jet crash have been identified through DNA testing, as reported by Indian authorities on June 18, bringing an end to an agonizing wait for the relatives of those involved. Among the 242 passengers and crew aboard the London-bound flight on June 12, there was only one survivor when the aircraft crashed into a residential area of Ahmedabad, resulting in the deaths of at least 38 individuals on the ground. Distraught family members have been submitting DNA samples to assist in the identification of their loved ones. “202 DNA samples have been matched,” stated Harsh Sanghavi, the home minister of Gujarat state, on X.The Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner transformed into a fireball upon crashing shortly after takeoff, with witnesses reporting the sight of severely charred bodies and scattered remains.
Indian authorities have yet to disclose the cause of the crash, and investigators from both Britain and the United States have joined the inquiry. The investigators are focused on retrieving crucial information from the two black boxes that were recovered from the crash site—the cockpit voice recorder and the flight data recorder. This year, India’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau upgraded a laboratory capable of analyzing black boxes. In the aftermath of the crash, the civil aviation regulator mandated inspections of Air India’s Dreamliners. Preliminary checks on the fleet “did not reveal any major safety concerns,” according to the regulator.”The aircraft and associated maintenance systems were found to be compliant with existing safety standards,” it added.
