The Air India Express aircraft, believed to be a Boeing 737-800, was at arriving from Dubai, where many Indians work, when it overran the runway and careered out of control.
It is believed that eight passengers survived the crash. They are being treated in hospital. It is reported there were 160 passengers and six crew on board.
Local television showed footage of the crashed plane lying on its belly some distance off the runway with smoke billowing from the fuselage. It came to rest in dense vetegation.
The dramatic footage also showed rescue workers taking away what looked like the body of a child from the crash site.
Firefighters sprayed foam on the plane as rescue workers battled to reach the site. However, the airport’s location, on a plateau surrounded by hills, made it difficult for the firefighters to reach the scene,
The Foreign and Commonwealth Office said it was urgently investigating whether there were any Britons on board.
Anup Shrivasta, Air India's personnel director, told a news conference in Mumbai. “As far as the information available with us is concerned, eight persons were rescued and shifted to local hospitals in Mangalore for their treatment. Air India is right now busy in confirming the casualties."
Prabhakar Sharma, the Deputy Commissioner of Mangalore, said: “Rescue operations are in full swing at the site and all government agencies are attending the situation.”
Superintendent Subramaneshwar Rao, of Mangalore police, said: “Chances [of finding more survivors ] are very bleak as most of the plane has been burned out.” Another Mangalore police official said smoke from the crash site was making it difficult for rescue workers to gain access to the plane.
Manmohan Singh, India’s prime minister, sent his condolences and promised compensation for the families of the victims.
Aviation experts said the airport’s “tabletop” runway, which ends in a valley, makes a bad crash inevitable if a plane overshoots it. The airport is about 19 miles outside Mangalore city.
The crash could be the deadliest in India since the November 1996 mid-air collision between a Saudi airliner and a Kazakh cargo plane near New Delhi that killed 349 people.
