NEW DELHI -- At least 160 people were killed Saturday morning when an Air India Express plane overshot a table-top runway in southern India, falling off a cliff into a valley, officials said.
The Boeing 737 from Dubai was carrying 163 passengers and nine crew members when it crashed outside the city of Mangalore, amid heavy weather in a hilly region. It then caught fire, hampering immediate rescue attempts from people in the neighboring village of Manapur.
"We have come here to help the authorities in whatever way we can. But it is really chaotic here. Nobody knows what is going on. Officials are talking on their wireless and rushing about," Sumathi Raj, one of the civilian rescuers, said by telephone.
Television images showed charred bodies being pulled out of the wreckage as firefighters worked to douse the flames. In one case, a child's limp, burned body was extricated from the smoldering plane by a policeman, who carried the child up a hill as other rescuers offered to pull him up.
V.S. Acharya, Home Minister for Karnataka state, told reporters that at least 160 people had died in the crash. Other officials put the number of dead at 60 but said they feared that it would soon sharply rise.
A senior civil aviation official in New Delhi said that about six survivors were pulled out of the wreckage and rushed to hospitals in serious condition. Two hospitals in Mangalore offer specialized care to patients with burn injuries.
"We have been geared up since morning to receive survivors. We have a burn ward in our hospital. But the fact that we have not got a single one here is bad news. It means there are not many survivors." said , a doctor at Father Mullers Medical College Hospital in Mangalore.
Jagan Nath, the Mangalore district health officer, said bodiesof victims were being transported to the morgue, where relatives and friends of passengers were gathering. "They are crying. Things are very bad," he said.
Indian television reported that the pilot of Air India Express 812 had not advised air-traffic controllers of any mechanical issues before the crash.
A senior captain of Air India who regularly flies the Mangalore route said the runway was lengthened to about 8,000 feet from about 5,300 feet about three years ago
"It is a safe airfield now," he said by telephone from Mumbai. "One edge of the runway is a steep drop. But we operate large aircraft there. It is adequate. ... This is hilly terrain. Within eight miles northeast of the runway, there are hills that are 6000 feet high."
Saturday's crash may rank as the country's deadliest aircraft disaster since 1996, when 349 people died after Saudi and Kazakh passenger planes collided in midair above north India.
