What we know about the Air India plane crash, investigation

Updated on: June 13, 2025 / 9:31 AM EDT/ CBS News

Authorities continued to investigate after a large passenger plane with 242 people on boardcrashed in the western Indian city of Ahmedabad, shortly after its departure for London Gatwick Airport. Officials say 241 of the passengers and crew on flight AI171 were confirmed dead, butone passenger survived. Casualties were also reported on the ground.

The plane, a Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner aircraft, left Ahmedabad Airport at 1:38 p.m. local time Thursday, June 12. The plane went down minutes later in a residential area, hitting buildings, including the dining area of a medical college, officials said.

Although law enforcement initially told reporters that no one on the plane survived, officials later confirmed thatone man had survivedand was being treated at a local hospital.

The director general of India's Directorate General of Civil Aviation, Faiz Ahmed Kidwai, told The Associated Press that flight AI171 crashed five minutes after its departure from Ahmedabad airport. The live tracking siteFlight Radarreported receiving a final signal from the aircraft only seconds after it took off.

Data collected by Flight Radar showed the jet briefly reaching a maximum barometric altitude of 625 feet before beginning to descend at a vertical speed of  about475 feet per minute— a steep dive.

Video shared online and verified by CBS Newsshowed the jet low over buildingsnear the airport, descending toward the ground and disappearing from view. An enormous ball of fire and smoke erupted seconds later.

The cause of the crash was not immediately clear. India's Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau is leading the investigation.

The U.S. National Transportation Safety Boardconfirmedit will lead a U.S. team currently heading to India to assist the local authorities. U.S. Federal Aviation Administration officials also said they are deploying teams to India to assist in the investigation alongside the NTSB.

"When an international incident occurs, that government leads the investigation," the FAA said in a statement. "In the event assistance is requested, the NTSB is the official U.S. representative and the FAA provides technical support. We stand ready to launch a team immediately in coordination with the NTSB."

Air India and Boeing said they are prepared to cooperate and support the investigation.

In videos of the crash, the plane appeared to have its landing gear down and flaps up at a time in the flight when those should have been reversed, said CBS News aviation safety analyst Robert Sumwalt, a former chairman of the NTSB.

Aviation consultant John M. Cox told the AP the aircraft had its nose up and was not climbing, which investigators are expected to look at.

"At this point, it's very, very, very early, we don't know a whole lot," he said. "But the 787 has very extensive flight data monitoring — the parameters on the flight data recorder are in the thousands — so once we get that recorder, they'll be able to know pretty quickly what happened."

The plane'stwo "black boxes"— the flight data and cockpit voice recorders — have beenrecovered from the wreckage, officials said.

"I think these are going to unlock the mystery of this accident, so it's critical to get these black boxes and get them read out," Sumwalt said.

India's civil aviation minister, Ram Mohan Naidu Kinjarapu, said he was "shocked and devastated" by the crash.

"We are on highest alert," Kinjarapuwrotein a social media post. "I am personally monitoring the situation and have directed all aviation and emergency response agencies to take swift and coordinated action."

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said "the tragedy in Ahmedabad has stunned and saddened us" and called it "heartbreaking beyond words."

The Air India crash happened in the city of Ahmedabad, near the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International Airport, where the plane had departed. Ahmedabad is located in the western Indian state of Gujarat.

Air India said in a statement that 241 people on the plane died in the crash. "The sole survivor is being treated in a hospital," the airlinesaid.

The passengers of the plane were identified as 169 Indian nationals, 53 British nationals, seven Portuguese nationals and one Canadian national, Air India said.

The lone survivor was later identified as Vishwashkumar Ramesh, a British national of Indian origin, who had been listed as the passenger in seat 11A on the flight manifest shared by Indian authorities.

"Everything happened in front of my eyes,"Ramesh said in an interviewwith Indian media from his hospital bed. "I don't believe how I survived. For some time I thought I was also going to die. But when I opened my eyes, I realized I was alive and I tried to unbuckle myself from the seat and escape."

Dr. Dhaval Gameti at Ahmedabad's Civil Hospital told the AP that while Ramesh "was disoriented with multiple injuries all over his body … he seems to be out of danger."

At least five medical students died when part of the plane hit the dining area of B.J. Medical College, Divyansh Singh, the vice president of the Federation of All India Medical Association told the AP.  Singh said almost 50 people who were in the building are injured — some critically.

"We are in close contact with our peers in the hospital who are on a lookout for more people feared buried in the debris," he said.

The Indian Army was assisting civil authorities in combing through the debris and helping to treat the injured, the AP reported.

London Gatwick Airport said it was working with Air India to establish hotlines for relatives of flight AI171's passengers.

"London Gatwick is liaising closely with Air India and a reception centre for relatives of those on board is being set up where information and support will be provided," airport officials said in a statement. "British nationals who require consular assistance or have concerns about friends or family should call 020 7008 5000. Air India have set up a dedicated passenger hotline number 1800 5691 444 to provide more information."

The Air India crash appeared to be the first involving aBoeing Dreamliner,accordingto the company's statistical summary of commercial jet accidents between 1954 and 2024.

The aircraft manufacturer has described this model as the aviation industry's "best-selling passenger widebody of all time."

"We are in contact with Air India regarding Flight 171 and stand ready to support them. Our thoughts are with the passengers, crew, first responders and all affected," a spokesperson for Boeing said in a statement to CBS News several hours after the incident.

On Wall Street,shares of Boeingfell $15.34, or 7.2%, to $198.66 in pre-market trading.

Emily Mae Czachor is a news editor at CBSNews.com. She typically covers breaking news, extreme weather and issues involving social and criminal justice. Emily Mae previously wrote for outlets like the Los Angeles Times, BuzzFeed and Newsweek.

© 2025 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Israeli airstrikes hit multiple Iran nuclear sites. Here’s what we know about them.

June 13, 2025 / 7:29 PM EDT/ CBS/AP

The Israeli military targeted Iranian nuclear facilities, research scientists and senior military commanders indozens of preemptive airstrikesearly Friday morning in what it dubbed "Operation Rising Lion."

The strikes — which the Israel Defense Forces said included dropping "over 330 different munitions" on more than 100targets in Iran— prompted Iran tolaunch about 100 missilesat Israel in a retaliatory attack later Friday. The IDF said its Iron Dome missile defense system intercepted most of the missiles, and U.S. officials confirmed that the United States helped Israel intercept Iranian missiles.

IDF spokesman Brig. Gen. Effie Defrin claimed intelligence showed "the Iranian regime has made significant progress in achieving nuclear capability and its ability to act against us," calling it an emerging and existential threat to Israel. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the U.S. was not involved in Israel's airstrikes on Iran.

The attacks came one day after the International Atomic Energy Agency's Board of Governors censured Iran for the first time in 20 years for not working with its inspectors. Iran immediately announced it would establish a third enrichment site in the country and swap out some centrifuges for more advanced ones.

The IAEA is the United Nations' Vienna-based nuclear watchdog. Itsaid in a confidential report last monththat Iran has further increased its stockpile of uranium enriched to near weapons-grade levels, and called on Tehran to urgently change course and comply with the agency's probe.

President Trump on Friday urged Iranto "make a deal, before there is nothing left" and to agree to new restrictions on its nuclear programwhile it still can. The president has previously said Iran cannot be allowed to enrich uranium, a term Iran has not been willing to accept. Steve Witkoff, the president's Middle East envoy, was set to hold a sixth round of talks with Iran in the Gulf state of Oman on Sunday.

Here's a look at some major Iranian sites and their importance in Tehran's program.

Iran's nuclear facility at Natanz, located some 135 miles southeast of Tehran, is the country's main enrichment site.

Part of the facility on Iran's Central Plateau is underground to defend against potential airstrikes. It operates multiple cascades, or groups of centrifuges working together to more quickly enrich uranium.

Iran also is burrowing into the Kūh-e Kolang Gaz Lā, or Pickax Mountain, which is just beyond Natanz's southern fencing. Natanz has been targeted by the Stuxnet computer virus, believed to be an Israeli and American creation, which destroyed Iranian centrifuges. Two separate sabotage attacks, attributed to Israel, also have struck the facility.

Intestimony Friday before the U.N.about Israel's strikes, IAEA Director-General Rafael Mariano Grossi said Iran confirmed that its Natanz Fuel Enrichment Plant had been attacked. He said the above-ground portion of the plant where Iran was producing uranium enriched up to 60% had "been destroyed" and centrifuges may have been damaged. He said Iranian authorities also reported attacks on the Fordow Fuel Enrichment Plant and Esfahan site.

Iran's nuclear facility at Fordo is located some 60 miles southwest of Tehran. It also hosts centrifuge cascades, but isn't as big a facility as Natanz.

Buried under a mountain and protected by anti-aircraft batteries,Fordo appears designed to withstand airstrikes.

Its construction began at least in 2007, according to the IAEA, although Iran only informed the U.N. nuclear watchdog about the facility in 2009 after the U.S. and allied Western intelligence agencies became aware of its existence.

Iran's only commercial nuclear power plant is in Bushehron the Persian Gulf, some 465 miles south of Tehran. Construction on the plant began under Iran's Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi in the mid-1970s. After the 1979 Islamic Revolution, the plant was repeatedly targeted in the Iran-Iraq war. Russia later completed construction of the facility.

Iran is building two other reactors like it at the site. Bushehr is fueled by uranium produced in Russia, not Iran, and is monitored by the IAEA.

The Arak heavy water reactoris 155 miles southwest of Tehran. Heavy water helps cool nuclear reactors, but it produces plutonium as a byproduct that can potentially be used in nuclear weapons. That would provide Iran another path to the bomb beyond enriched uranium, should it choose to pursue the weapon. Iran had agreed under its 2015 nuclear deal with world powers to redesign the facility to relieve proliferation concerns.

The U.S.withdrewfrom the international nuclear agreement known as the JCPOA, or Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, in 2018, and Iran partially withdrew in 2019.

The facility in Isfahan, some 215 miles southeast of Tehran, employs thousands of nuclear scientists. It also is home to three Chinese research reactors and laboratories associated with the country's atomic program.

The Tehran Research Reactor is at the headquarters of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, the civilian body overseeing the country's atomic program. The U.S. actually provided Iran the reactor in 1967 as part of America's "Atoms for Peace" program during the Cold War. It initially required highly enriched uranium but was later retrofitted to use low-enriched uranium over proliferation concerns.

Kathryn Watson,Melissa QuinnandMargaret Brennancontributed to this report.

© 2025 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Tourist reportedly suspected of murdering her family in Iceland

Updated on: June 15, 2025 / 9:25 AM EDT/ CBS/AFP

A French tourist in her 60s has been arrested in Iceland suspected of murdering her daughter and husband while the three were vacationing in the country, Icelandic media reported.

The husband and daughter were found dead at an upscale hotel in Iceland's capital Reykjavik on Saturday morning, while the woman was found alive with stab injuries,Icelandic broadcaster RUV reportedlate Saturday.

The two deceased also had "injuries, including stab injuries, but there will be a further investigation that will reveal what kind of injuries are involved," Reykjavik police officer Aevar Palmi Palmason told RUV.

RUV reported that the bodies were found on the fourth floor of the Edition Hotel and the group was due to leave Saturday.

Icelandic police were unavailable to comment Sunday on the investigation, and have yet to confirm that the suspect was related to the victims.

Icelandic media have provided no details about the tourists' identities.

Police have onlyconfirmed in a statementthat the Reykjavik district court on Saturday remanded the woman in custody until June 20, "in connection with (a police) investigation into the deaths of two French tourists at a hotel in the city center."

"The woman who is detained was traveling with those who died when the case arose," the statement said.

In a previousstatement, police said two foreign tourists were found dead in the hotel at about 8:00 a.m. o'clock, and a third person, also a tourist, was also at the scene and was injured.

"Many details are unclear as the investigation is in its early stages," police said.

Murders and deadly violence are rare in Iceland, with the country regularly ranked at the top of the Global Peace Index thanks to its low crime rates, though gang crime has been on the rise in recent years.

According toStatista, Iceland has one of the lowest murder rates in Europe — only two persons were killed on the island in 2021.

In 2017, the normally peaceful Iceland was shocked when a 20-year-old woman was foundmurderedon the beach.

© 2025 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Agence France-Presse contributed to this report.

Tourists break crystal-covered chair at Italian museum

June 15, 2025 / 10:59 AM EDT/ CBS News

AnItalianmuseum is calling for visitors to respect the art on display after a tourist couple broke a crystal-covered chair before fleeing.

The Palazzo Maffei in Verona, Italy, releasedsecurity video footagethis week that shows a man and a woman taking pictures of each other while pretending to sit on Nicola Bolla's so-called "Van Gogh" chair. The art furniture is covered in hundreds of Swarovski crystals made from polished, machine-cut glass and is named in honor ofVincent van Gogh.

At one point, the man appears to slip and fall onto the chair, crushing it. Museum officials said the couple fled before staff members noticed what happened.

"Every museum's nightmare has come true," the museum said in a social media post sharing the footage.

Museum officials said local police have been contacted about the couple, who have not been identified, CBS News partnerBBC reported.

"Sometimes we lose our brains to take a picture, and we don't think about the consequences," museum director Vanessa Carlon told the BBC. "Of course it was an accident, but these two people left without speaking to us — that isn't an accident."

Two of the chair's legs were broken but the museum was able to restore them. The chair is back on display.

Carlotta Menegazzo, an art historian based at the Palazzo Maffei, told the BBC that while the chair looks sturdy, the frame is mostly hollow.

"On the chair was a note warning people not to touch, and of course it is placed on a pedestal, so it's quite clear it's not a real chair," she said.

According to the BBC, the incident took place in April, and the museum only released the security camera footage this week to raise awareness.

"We are sharing this episode not only for the record, but to start a real awareness campaign on the value of art and the respect it deserves," the museum said in a social media post.

The Palazzo Maffei opened in 2020 and has 650 pieces on display.

Lucia Suarez Sang is an associate managing editor at CBSNews.com. Previously, Lucia was the director of digital content at FOX61 News in Connecticut and has previously written for outlets including FoxNews.com, Fox News Latino and the Rutland Herald.

© 2025 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.

2 dead, 32 injured in bridge collapse at tourist destination in India

June 15, 2025 / 1:10 PM EDT/ AP

At least two people died and 32 others were injured after an iron bridge over a river collapsed on Sunday at a popular tourist destination in India's western Maharashtra state, the state's top elected official said.

Devendra Fadnavis, the chief minister of Maharashtra, said at least six people were hospitalized in critical condition because of their injuries. In a social mediapost, Fadnavis said he was "deeply saddened to learn about the tragic incident" and offered condolences to the families of the victims who died.

Local media reported that scores of tourists were on the bridge when it collapsed, plunging many into the swollen river. Fadnavis also acknowledged people had been swept away and said a search operation was ongoing to find them. Six people have been rescued so far, he said.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi "expressed deep grief" over the collapse in a phone conversation with Fadnavis where he pledged to provide any resources necessary to the Maharashtra state government,accordingto the chief minister's office.

The incident occurred in the Kundamala area in Pune district, which has witnessed heavy rains over the past few days, giving the river a steady flow, Press Trust of India reported.

It was not raining when the bridge collapsed in an area frequented by picnickers, the news agency reported.

Police said teams of the National Disaster Response Force and other search and recovery units have undertaken rescue operations, Press Trust said.

India's infrastructure has long been marred by safety concerns, sometimes leading to major disasters on its highways and bridges.

In 2022, a century-old cable suspension bridge collapsed into a river in the western state of Gujarat, sending hundreds plunging into the water and killing at least 132 in one of the worst accidents in the country in the past decade.

© 2025 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Tidak Ada Lagi Postingan yang Tersedia.

Tidak ada lagi halaman untuk dimuat.