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Known as Sam the Wheels, he filmed aspects of community life in south London, including Brixton riots of 1981

Clovis Salmon, regarded as the first black documentary film-maker in the UK, has died at the age of 98.

His family said he died at King’s College hospital in Camberwell on Wednesday morning.

Salmon was best-known for filming the Brixton riots in 1981. Often using a concealed camera to avoid getting it confiscated by police officers, he captured scenes of overturned cars, smouldering buildings and growing anger at police tactics.

Asked to explain the riots, one of his interviewees said: “Jobs, money, National Front, and all the rest, we’d just had enough, so we just explode.”

In aninterview for the Guardian in 2021, Salmon said he filmed everything he saw during the riots. “For three days, I went up and down different places, everywhere I heard that they were fighting, riding my bike. And I always take my camera with me.”

Salmon came to Brixton from Jamaica in 1954 as part of the Windrush generation and has left behind an archive with hundreds of hours of footage covering many aspects of community life in southLondon. In the Great Conflict of Somerleyton Road, he documented a struggle to build the first black church in Brixton in the mid-1960s.

He was also known locally as Sam the Wheels for his cycle repair business and his collection of secondhand bikes that tumbled on to the pavement of his house on Railton Road.

Salmon’s varied career included stints working in factories in Jamaica and cane fields in Florida, and later as a deacon in a Pentecostal church in London. As a mechanic, for Holdsworth Cycles, he could build wheels twice as fast as his white colleagues and soon earned a reputation as the“fastest wheel builder in Britain”.

Salmon’s significance as a film-maker was not recognised until very late in his life. In 2021 his documentaries featured at the Barbican arts centre in London, as part of its Decolonising Lens series. And last year he was awarded an OBE for services to culture and the black community.

Mark Sealy, director of the arts agency Autograph, said: “Sam was a maverick self-taught recorder of black life, and probably Britain’s most important overlooked black film-maker.”

Lucy Davies, director of 198 Contemporary Arts and Learning, has been promoting Salmon’s work since 2006 and is coordinating a project to digitise his archive and make it accessible online. “Sam got his flowers in the end, but not until the end of his life,” she said.

Davies added: “Sam did something that was unique – he filmed and documented the black community of Brixton at a time when the only other recording of the community was done by established media like the BBC or Pathé News.

“And because he kept going over many decades, his work serves as an archive of the black community in the postwar migration period.”

She added: “He took it upon himself to document his own community during a really important period without any external support.”

He is survived by his wife, Delores. In a statement his family said: “He was a proud father of five children, grandfather to 10, and great-grandfather to many.”

An installation of bicycles remains on Railton Road in his honour.

Jennifer Abbott, 69, was found dead in her Camden flat with tape on her mouth

A missing diamond-encrusted Rolex watch may be linked to the stabbing of a 69-year-old woman who was found dead in her north London flat, the Metropolitan police have said.

Jennifer Abbott, who was known professionally as Sarah Steinberg, was discovered fatally injured with tape on her mouth.

She had last been seen three days earlier, on 10 June, walking her pet corgi in Camden.

An ambulance crew was called to Abbott’s home in Mornington Place, Camden, at about 6pm on 13 June and she was pronounced dead at the scene.

Her pet corgi had been shut in the bathroom for three days, but survived.

Police said a postmortem examination was carried out on Sunday and gave the cause of death as sharp force trauma.

Detectives are keeping an open mind about the possible motive for the murder but are appealing for information about the watch, which they believe is missing from Abbott’s address.

A neighbour, who did not wish to be named, told PA Media that her son went out to help Abbott’s niece and the pair discovered her body.

The neighbour said: “My son broke the door down. We heard her niece shouting: ‘Somebody help me, somebody help’ and we went out and asked: ‘What’s wrong?’ She said: ‘I haven’t heard from my aunty in four days. Something’s wrong – break the door down.’

“I was holding the door open downstairs and my son was upstairs and then I heard her niece screaming and saying: ‘Oh my God, she’s been murdered.’ She had tape across her mouth.

“Her corgi was locked in the bathroom for three days. That poor dog, he couldn’t even drink any water, it’s amazing he was even still alive.”

The neighbour added that Abbott “had done a lot of things in her life”.

They added: “She was a doctor but she was also an actor and director in America. She’d directed a movie and I looked at it on YouTube and saw her interviewed in Los Angeles. She was a character. She was lovely.”

No arrests have been made in connection with Abbott’s death.

The Met Ch Supt Jason Stewart said the force was working closely with colleagues in the homicide team to establish exactly what had happened and were appealing for information from the public.

He said: “Were you out in Camden on Friday? Perhaps you had been coming home from work, or at an event nearby? Did you see or hear anything around Mornington Place that struck you as being unusual?

“Someone must have seen or heard something and no piece of information is too small. It could be the crucial clue that leads us to identify Jennifer’s murderer.”

Stewart added: “Extra patrols continue in the area while my officers remain at the crime scene. I would urge anyone who has any information, or who may be worried, to speak to them.”

In letter to culture secretary, carnival’s chair says more money ‘essential’ to event’s future, but does not give a figure

The future of theNotting Hill carnivalcould be in jeopardy without “urgent funding” from the government, according to a leaked letter from its organisers.

The carnival’s chair, Ian Comfort, has written to the culture secretary,Lisa Nandy, to request public money, the BBC reported on Wednesday.

It follows a review of the festival in westLondonthat began in 1966, which identified “critical public safety concerns” that needed additional funding to address, the letter said.

Comfort wrote that the money was “essential to safeguarding the future and public safety of this iconic event”, but did not state a figure.

The independent safety review, whose findings and recommendations have not been made public, was commissioned by the carnival’s organisers and paid for at a cost of £100,000 by the Greater London Authority (GLA), Kensington and Chelsea council and Westminster city council.

In the leaked letter to Nandy, Comfort also referred to a separate report published in April by the London Assembly. He said the research highlighted the increasing strain placed on the Metropolitan police during large-scale public events.

“Limited resourcing has restricted the police service’s ability to respond to growing operational pressures,” Comfort said in the letter.

He went on to say that increased investment in stewarding and crowd management was “now essential to allow the police to focus on their primary role of crime prevention and public protection”.

Comfort added that a failure to secure immediate additional funding “risks compromising public safety and jeopardising the future of the carnival”.

The carnival chair said although the GLA and the two councils had provided “substantial support” for stewarding during past festivals, they could no longer “meet the growing operational requirements identified in the review”.

The Met police’s assistant commissioner, Matt Twist, previously raised concerns of a “mass casualty event” at the carnival due to crowd density.

Giving evidence to the London Assembly police and crime committee last September, Twist said: “While we acknowledge that crime often gets the headlines, the thing that worries me most is the crowd density and the potential for a mass casualty event.”

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The carnival, second only to Brazil’s Rio carnival in size and considered to be the largest street event in Europe, attracts about 2 million people over the August bank holiday weekend. This year’s event is scheduled to take place on 24 and 25 August.

The Met had about 7,000 officers on duty for last year’s festivities, drawn from local policing teams and specialist units.

The Department for Culture, Media and Sport told the BBC it would “respond to the letter in due course”.

Claudia Jones, a Trinidadian human rights activist based in London, put on an indoor Caribbean carnival at St Pancras Town Hall (now Camden Town Hall) in north London in 1959, which is credited with inspiring Notting Hill carnival.

In 1966 the first outdoor festival took place on the streets of Notting Hill, with Rhaune Laslett, a social worker of Native American and Russian descent, organising an event for local children.

According to the carnival’s website, Laslett was a community activist with a history of addressing inter-cultural tension in the area since the violent race riots of the 1950s and set out to include the local West Indian community in her event.

The organisers of Notting Hill carnival have been contacted for comment.

Head of monitoring boards urges justice secretary to suspend rollout of Pava in England and Wales

The rollout of synthetic pepper spray for use to incapacitate jailed children is “wholly irresponsible” while black and minority prisoners are more likely to be subjected to force than white inmates, a watchdog has said.

Elisabeth Davies, the national chair of the Independent Monitoring Boards, whose members operate in every prison inEnglandand Wales, said the justice secretary, Shabana Mahmood, should pause the use of Pava spray in youth offending institutions (YOIs) until ministers had addressed the disproportionate use of force on minority prisoners.

“There is clear racial disproportionality when it comes to the use of force,” she told the Guardian. “It is therefore, I think, wholly irresponsible to expand use-of-force measures before disproportionality issues are addressed.”

Mahmoodauthorised the rollout of Pavaacross YOIs in England and Wales in April amid growing demands from the Prison Officers’ Association (POA) to protect staff from attacks.

The government’s “use of force” evaluation report, published in April, found black prisoners were nearly twice as likely as white prisoners to experience Pava and baton use. Using official data to March 2023, the report found that 409 of every 1,000 black inmates were subjected to use of force, compared with 208.6 per 1,000 white prisoners.

Davies urged ministers to hold back on rolling out Pava spray in the youth system until the racial disparities were properly addressed.

“We’ve got evidence that the growing reliance on visible weapons – such as the rollout of Pava spray in the male youth state and the trial of Tasers in the adult male prison state – is deeply concerning for people with lived experience,” she said. “Our board members have been told that the visible presence patterns make [prisoners] feel constantly afraid, and that’s increasing tension rather than easing it.”

According to the IMB’s national annual report, released on Wednesday, black prisoners at HMP Elmley on the Isle of Sheppey in Kent were significantly more likely to have force applied to them than white prisoners.

At HMP Birmingham, the category B jail once known as Winson Green, there was evidence of “clear racial disparities in the use of force”, despite the diversity of prison staff and the introduction of cultural awareness training.

Amid a deepening overcrowding crisis, some prison officers will be trialled with stun guns this summer, while the Conservatives have said some should begiven access to live ammunition.

It follows anattack on three officersat HMP Frankland by Hashem Abedi, a terrorist involved in the Manchester Arena bombing.

Davies said prison officers showed “remarkable bravery’ in challenging conditions but the majority of assaults were actually between inmates.

“We’re seeing violence driven by overcrowding, by mental health crisis and rapid drug use,” she said. “One of the most effective ways to reduce violence is through strong and respectable relationships between staff and prisoners.”

Squirted from a canister, Pava spray, or pelargonic acid vanillylamide, causes searing pain and discomfort in the eyes for about 40 minutes and a burning sensation to skin. It was rolled out in men’s prisons in England andWalesin 2018.

There are three publicly run YOIs and one that is privately run, holding young offenders up to the age of 21. According to government statistics covering 2022, most children in prison were from ethnic minorities.

Data obtained in April by theHoward Leaguethrough freedom of information requests showed that black men were almost three times more likely to be sprayed with Pava than white men in prison, and young black men under the age of 25 were five times more likely to be sprayed than their white counterparts.

Responding to Davies, Mark Fairhurst, the national chair of the POA, said IMB members were “not the ones on the receiving end of life-changing injuries” from violent youths.

“It would be wholly irresponsible of the government not to give my brave colleagues the protections they need when dealing with violence,” he said. “Using the ethnicity or age of offenders to excuse their violent behaviour is shameful … Nobody should ever enter their workplace and be expected to become a victim.”

A Youth Custody Service spokesperson said: “Pava will only be used as a last resort to protect staff and young people from serious harm, such as violent incidents involving weapons. Staff will receive specialist training, and every use will be closely scrutinised with strict controls in place.”

Campaign group threatens legal action over ‘intolerable’ delays to new policies required after landmark case

The Scottish government has been given a deadline to implement the UK supreme court’s ruling on biological sex across all public bodies or face further legal challenges.

Sex Matters, the UK-wide gender-critical campaign group, has threatened legal action in 14 days if ministers continue “intolerable” delays to new policies and guidance required byApril’s landmark rulingthat the legal definition of a woman in the Equality Act 2010 does not include transgender women who hold gender recognition certificates.

The move reflects ongoing frustration among gender-critical campaign groups at what For Women Scotland, who brought the supreme court case,described as “extraordinary pushback”since the unanimous judgment.

Politicians,LGBT+ rights groupsandprominent supportershave raised concerns that the ruling could result in the erosion of rights, privacy and dignity of trans people across the UK.

These fears were increased after the equality watchdog the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) brought out interim advice soon after the judgment which, they said, amounted to a blanket ban on trans people using toilets of their lived gender, which many in the community said effectively excluded them from public spaces.

The ruling has wide-ranging implications for service providers, public bodies and businesses, with the EHRC currently consulting on a revised code of practice that will provide a practical guide on implementation.

However, the Sex Matters letter says the consultation is “not an invitation – particularly to public authorities – to act in a way that is unlawful in the meantime”. Sex Matters intervened in the supreme court case that was brought by For WomenScotlandagainst the Scottish government over a law aimed at improving gender representation on public boards.

Maya Forstater, a founder of Sex Matters, said the supreme court was clear that legal protection for trans people “does not translate into a right to use opposite-sex services”, adding that allowing trans women to use women’s toilets, showers and changing rooms had “created a hostile environment for women”.

Sex Matters is particularly concerned about the Scottish government’s guidance for schools, which encourage teaching staff offer flexible arrangements for young transgender people and states that the use of toilets is governed by social convention rather than law.

The Good Law Project, which is challenging the EHRC’s interim advice in court next month, revealed earlier this week that the commissionappeared to be rolling backon its initial blanket position.

Last weekend, For Women Scotland co-director Susan Smith encouraged individuals to “keep pressure on MSPs and MPs”, and make use of the fighting fund announced by the author and activist, JK Rowling, to launch their own actions.

Rowling said the fund was “not going to be sharing any details or figures about applications and inquiries, as it’s a private fund, not a fundraising charity, and funding details are strictly confidential”.

A Scottish government spokesperson said that they would respond to the letter in due course.

They said: “The Scottish government has been clear that we accept the supreme court judgment. We are reviewing policies, guidance and legislation potentially impacted by the judgment.”

Flights involving Boeing Dreamliners cancelled on routes including London, Paris, Vienna and Dubai

Air India has cancelled at least eight international flights operated byBoeing787-8 Dreamliners, the aircraft model involved in the crash last week that killed at least 270 people.

The cancellations on Tuesday affected services to cities including London, Paris, Vienna and Dubai. The airline cited a combination of aircraft unavailability, technical snags, airspace restrictions, and extended safety checks.

At least three other Dreamliner flights have been grounded or delayed in the past 48 hours, as India’s aviation regulator ordered rigorous pre-flight inspections across Air India’s fleet of 33 Dreamliners. A Boeing 777 operating the San Francisco-Mumbai route was also grounded because of a technical hitch.

The disruption came as pressure mounted on Air India and Boeing as the investigation into India’s deadliest plane crash in decades continued. Investigators are pursuing multiple theories, including what some independent experts believe may have been a catastrophic – and extremely rare – dual engine failure.

Offering a measure of relief for Air India late on Tuesday, India’s aviation regulator said it had found no major safety flaws in the airline’s Dreamliner fleet but warned of persistent maintenance shortcomings and coordination lapses that could undermine reliability.

The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), which conducted in-depth inspections of 24 Dreamliners, raised concerns over delays linked to spare-part shortages and weak internal coordination between engineering, ground handling, and operations teams.

Still, in a boost to theTataowned airline, which is facing intense scrutiny after the crash, the DGCA said all inspected Dreamliners were compliant with existing aviation safety standards. The wide-body jets form the backbone of Air India’s long-haul network.

Flight AI171 issued a Mayday call moments after taking off from Ahmedabad’s Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel international airport on 12 June. It reached only 650 feet before crashing into a medical college complex, erupting into a fireball. Onlyone of the 242 people onboard survived, with at least 29 people on the ground also killed.

By Tuesday, officials had matched the DNA of 135 victims and returned 101 bodies to relatives, though they said five of those individuals had not been listed on the flight manifest.

The identification process has been slow and gruelling. Many victims were burned beyond recognition, and officials said the remains were being processed in small batches through genetic testing. The official death toll cannot be finalised until the meticulous process of DNA identification is complete.

Dr Rakesh Joshi, medical superintendent at Ahmedabad civil hospital, said “135 DNA samples have been matched, and 101 bodies have already been handed over to the respective families. Of these 101 deceased, five were not on board the flight.” He said he hoped DNA profiling would be completed by Wednesday.

The sole survivor, a 40-year-old British national of Indian origin, Vishwash Kumar Ramesh, described the horror of the crash: “Right in front of my eyes, I saw air hostesses, uncles, aunties dying,” said Ramesh, who lost his brother Ashok in the tragedy.

On Tuesday, hundreds of people gathered in Mumbai to pay an emotional farewell at the funeral of the flight’s captain, Sumeet Sabharwal, whose final actions may have prevented even greater loss of life. A veteran pilot with more than 8,000 hours of experience, he has been praised for appearing to have steered the aircraft clear of a densely populated area.

India’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau is leading the inquiry, supported by UK and US safety agencies. Investigators are examiningmultiple potential causes, from thrust-and-flap settings to fact that the landing gear did not appear to have retracted. Investigators, who haverecovered the cockpit voice and flight data recorders, are also looking at whether the aircraft lost thrust in both engines. “There was some sort of dual engine failure,” said Steve Scheibner, a former US navy pilot, commentator, and a retired American Airlines captain.

The DGCA has asked Air India to submit records from recent inspections and detailed personnel files of the pilots and flight dispatcher, Reuters reported. It has also ordered safety drills in all airports and instructed flying schools to conduct compliance checks.

The crash marks a pivotal moment for Air India. The tea-to-steel Tata Group, which acquired the carrier in 2022 after nearly 70 years of state ownership, has invested billions of dollars to modernise its ageing fleet and revive the brand’s image.

Natarajan Chandrasekaran, chair of Tata Sons, said: “We need to use this incident as an act of force to build a safer airline. We’re going to get through this.”

Boeing’s commercial chief, Stephanie Pope, met Chandrasekaran at Air India’s headquarters near Delhi on Tuesday. The tragedy involving Boeing’s most advanced aircraft in service has renewed scrutiny of the manufacturer’s controversial safety record. Boeing has said only that it was “focused on supporting the investigation”.

Exclusive: Video and documents give rare glimpse inside daily life of the imprisoned civilian leader as she nears her 80th birthday

Rare footage ofAung San Suu Kyiinside a Myanmar courtroom and detailed records of her daily prison routine have been seen by the Guardian, offering a glimpse into the life of the country’s ousted civilian leader as she nears her 80th birthday.

Since the militaryseized power in February 2021, little has been seen or heard of Aung San Suu Kyi, who led Myanmar for six years before her arrest. She is held in solitary confinement with access to the outside world strictly controlled and only rare supervised visits from her legal team.

The videos, dated August and December 2022, show Aung San Suu Kyi appearing in a makeshift courtroom with deposed president Win Myint during military-run corruption trials that were condemned by the UN, US and EU as politically motivated. The cases contributed to her 33-year prison sentence.

The footage and logs – shown to the Guardian by military defector group People’s Embrace – shed light on her condition and routine, amidconcerns from her family and supportersthat her health has seriously deteriorated and her life may be at risk.

The logs cover a handful of days in January and February 2024 and detail a regimented life inside a specially built detention facility in Naypyidaw, the capital, in which she remains isolated from the outside world and the violent civil war engulfing her country.

AMyanmarprison source, unaffiliated with the group, who last saw her in early 2024 confirmed the material.

“Her voice and way of walking remained unchanged,” said the source. “She has stopped wearing flowers in her hair – partly because she doesn’t want to.”

The records raise concerns about Aung San Suu Kyi’s health and detail the medications she receives for a range of issues.

Dr Aung Kyaw, 30, a former political prisoner jailed for treating anti-coup protesters, described her care as “rudimentary and basic”.

“It addresses only the symptoms, not the root causes,” he said, adding that poor nutrition, lack of sunlight, and the risk of dehydration and heatstroke during central Myanmar’s sweltering summer could worsen her health. The records show that on at least one day the temperature in her room reached 31C.

He added she might be especially vulnerable to Covid-19, tuberculosis and skin infections, which are common in Myanmar’s prisons.

“The health implications of keeping someone who’s almost 80 in confined space and isolation, and cutting her connection with family and friends, can have a very heavy toll on her physical and mental health.”

Logs show her days as beginning at 4.30am and ending about 8.30pm. She meditates for over an hour each morning and walks around the room for evening exercise, using Buddhist prayer beads throughout the day.

In one entry, she is recorded having a lunch of “two spoons of rice, chicken, fish balls soup, two pieces of chocolate, and a piece of dragon fruit” – her largest meal of the day.

Meals in general are sparse: “two half-fried eggs” for breakfast; small portions of rice, meat or fish for lunch; soup and bread for dinner.

Aung San Suu Kyi receives junta-controlled newspapers, providing some awareness of the civil war engulfing the country since 2021.

Within days of her detention,peaceful protests erupted across Myanmar, but were violently suppressed by the military. In their wake emerged civilian resistance groups, some backed by ethnic armies that have fought for borderland autonomy for decades. The conflict has claimed thousands of lives, with the military accused of widespread atrocities.

Aung San Suu Kyi has spent decades under some form of military detention; from 1989 to 2010 she was under house arrest at her family’s lakeside Yangon home because of her outspoken opposition to the military junta ruling Myanmar at that time.

During that period she maintained links with the outside world through radios on which she listened to the BBC World Service and Voice of America. In her current detention, Aung San Suu Kyi is not afforded the same privileges, however according to the source her legal team has managed to fulfil some of her requests for English-language books and French novels. The logs show she spends hours reading every day.

Her son, Kim Aris, said his last contact with her was a letter “over two years ago” focused on “family matters”.

“We know the military would censor everything. We don’t talk about anything political. I was filling her in with how my children are, and enquiring after her health, similar to what she does when she writes to me.”

He said he would feel “so much happier” if she were in her Yangon home, where she had access to a doctor and some contact with the outside world. Since its coup, the military has made severalunsuccessful attempts to auction the property.

“I am extremely concerned,” Aris said. “A lot of the world seems to think she’s under house arrest, and that’s just not the case. I don’t even know if she’s alive or not – there’s no way to confirm that.”

Aris, who has been raising humanitarian funds for Myanmar, plans to run 80 kilometres over eight days ahead of her 80th birthday on 19 June.

“She never wanted me to get involved in politics, but there are ways we can help,” he said. “I’ve never seen the situation in Burma this bad. It’s getting worse every day for everybody there.”

The UN reported in January 2025 that nearly half of Myanmar’s population was living below the poverty line, with essential services crumbling and the economy in disarray.

In June 2022, Aung San Suu Kyi’s legal team ordered a birthday cake featuring her photograph, according to a source familiar with the occasion. A small celebration was held after a court hearing, where she shared the cake with court staff and guards.

Sean Turnell, an Australian economist who served as her adviser and was imprisoned in Myanmarbefore his release in November 2022, said she refused air conditioning because it was not available to other inmates.

“They don’t mind us [high-profile prisoners] suffering, but they don’t want us to die,” he said. “It’s a dangerous game they’re playing.”

He was sentenced in the same prefabricated courtroom shown in the videos, he said, located near the prison staff buildings within the compound in Naypyidaw.

Turnell recalled when he last saw her after two years in detention she had “lost a hell of a lot of weight”, though her spirit remained “undiminished.”

In April 2024, a junta spokesperson said Aung San Suu Kyi and Win Myint were moved to an unspecified site due to extreme heat – a claim the source believes may indicate transfer to a military compound.

On the military’s approach to Aung San Suu Kyi, Turnell said the junta appears content to “wait it out” – but warned of consequences if she were to die in custody.

“There would be incredible anger in Burma,” he said, adding that her death could push non-aligned people into resistance.

Inside Myanmar, Aung San Suu Kyi remains a revered figure – the daughter of independence hero Aung San and a symbol of the country’s pro-democracy struggle.

Yet her international standing collapsed after 2017,when she defended Myanmar against genocide allegations at the international court of justiceover military atrocities against the Rohingya Muslim minority. Nearly a million Rohingya fled Myanmar to refugee camps in neighbouring Bangladesh.

Democracy activist Nilar Thein, widow of dissident Ko Jimmy whose execution by the junta in 2022 caused international outrage, said the military fears Aung San Suu Kyi “because they know she would expose their wrongdoings” and “reinvigorate the resistance”.

But, she added, the movement was not dependent on Aung San Suu Kyi’s release.

“This is a popular uprising driven by the people themselves,” she said. “And it will continue to move forward.”

The charges against the Nobel laureate – incitement, electoral fraud and corruption – have been dismissed by rights groups as a sham. In August 2023,the junta issued a partial pardon, reducing her sentence to 27 years – meaning she would be released aged 105.

She is one of more than 29,200 people detained since the 2021 coup, according to monitoring group the Assistance Association of Political Prisoners.

The junta did not respond to a request for comment.

Aviation journalist Jeff Wise on the crash of flight AI171, in which at least 270 people died, and how one passenger in seat 11A managed to survive

AirIndiaflight AI171 took off from Ahmedabad airport on the afternoon of 12 June with 242 people on board. Less than a minute later, it had crashed into a medical college about 1km away.

Including those on the ground, at least 270 people were killed. But one passenger miraculously survived. Vishwash Kumar Ramesh, a British national sat in seat 11A, was able to walk away from the scene – though, as he found out soon after, his brother had died on board.

The aviation journalistJeff Wiseexplains what investigators will be looking at to determine the cause the crash – from the plane’s landing gear, to its wing flaps and possible pilot error.Helen Piddasks how it was possible that Ramesh was able to escape with his life.

Investigators reportedly examining whether ‘last resort’ ram air turbine functioned after takeoff

The sole survivor of the AirIndiacrash has helped carry his brother’s flower-heaped coffin to a crematorium in the western Indian coastal town of Diu, days after they plummeted into the ground shortly after takeoff.

With bandages still on his face and arm, Vishwash Kumar Ramesh, 40, who wasdischarged from hospital on Tuesday, broke into sobs and was consoled by relatives.

Just six days earlier, the Leicester businessman had been sitting with his brother Ajay on the London-bound Boeing 787 Dreamliner thatcrashed into a medical college hostel in Ahmedabadafter taking off.

All 241 other passengers and crew onboard the flight last Thursday died, as did at least 30 people on the ground, including five medical students.

Ramesh and his brother, who was sitting a few rows away, had been heading back to the UK after holidaying with family in India. Ramesh escaped through a small space by his seat and stumbled through the flames and smoke into the arms of rescuers.

“It’s a miracle I survived,” he told the Sun. “I am OK physically, but I feel terrible that I could not save Ajay.”

The streets were filled with mourners as Ramesh walked with his brother’s coffin on his shoulder, his mother beside him in a monsoon-rain-drenched blue sari. More than a dozen of the crash victims were from Diu, a beach town on the Arabian Sea once ruled by the Portuguese.

The funeral was held asthe Wall Street Journal reportedthat crash investigators believe flight 171’s emergency power system, known as a ram air turbine (RAT), was deployed during takeoff.

Establishing the definitive cause of the crash could take years. But the preliminary finding prompts questions about whether the plane’s engines functioned properly in the crucial moments after takeoff.

Flight data from Flightradar24 showed that the Dreamliner climbed to 625 feet. Moments before the plane crashed, the pilot made a distress call: “Thrust not achieved … falling … Mayday! Mayday! Mayday!”

A CCTV video clip showed the plane begin to descend about 17 seconds after takeoff.

The RAT is a small propeller that drops from the underside of the Dreamliner’s fuselage to provide emergency electricity. While the engines usually supply power for electrical and flight-control systems, the RAT is designed to step in when normal systems fail. It is considered a last resort in aviation emergencies.

“The most common occurrence is when a pilot thinks that both engines failed,” Anthony Brickhouse, a US-based aerospace safety consultant, told the Wall Street Journal. He said in commercial aviation, “a dual engine failure is extremely rare … Our engines today are more efficient and reliable than ever.”

Though widely praised for its fuel efficiency and long range, the 787 Dreamliner has been dogged by quality control issues. Last week’s crash was the first fatal incident involving a 787, but its fallout could be far-reaching.

Boeing, which manufactures the aircraft, and GE Aerospace, which makes the engines, had declined to comment, the newspaper said.

Findings from the wreckage suggest the flaps and other control surfaces were correctly configured for takeoff, indicating the flight crew followed standard procedures, the newspaper said, citing investigators.

The report comes a day after India’s aviation regulator, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), said its own inspections found no “major safety concerns” in the Dreamliner fleet but did flag recurring maintenance issues.

Air India’s chair, Natarajan Chandrasekaran, toldthe Times Now Indian news channelon Wednesday that the aircraft had nothing of concern in its maintenance history.

He said the right engine was installed in March, and the left engine was serviced in 2023. Chandrasekaran added he expected preliminary findings to be out in 30 days. “Everybody needs closure,” he said. “We need to know.”

So far, DNA tests have identified 190 of the badly burned victims, and the bodies of 19 have been handed to their families, the Press Trust of India reported. Forensic teams are working around the clock to identify the dead.

As of Wednesday, at least 13 Dreamliner flights were grounded and the DGCA confirmed that 66 Boeing 787 flights had been cancelled since the crash. Air India officials cited “technical issues” and “extended precautionary checks” as the reasons for the cancelled flights.

The schedule disruptions are the latest blow to the Tata Group-owned airline’s ambitious overhaul of the former state-owned carrier, and the timing could not be worse, with summer travel demand surging.

UK Foreign Office causes confusion as it urges British nationals to register their presence but not to leave

The UK government removed families of Foreign Office officials fromIsraeldue to security concerns but is continuing to advise British nationals to remain and to follow local guidance – prompting questions over whether the approaches are consistent.

While the dependants of diplomatic staff have left as a “precautionary measure”, with staff remaining at the embassy in Tel Aviv and the consulate in Jerusalem, the broader travel advice has not changed.

British nationals currently in Israel are being urged to register their presence online, but are not being advised to leave. Instead they are being told to monitor Israeli government alerts and make individual decisions based on their location and circumstances.

Although thousands of people currently in Israel or the occupied Palestinian territories are understood to have registered their presence with theForeign, Commonwealth and Development Office(FCDO), the government has not moved to advise a general departure.

Israel and Iran have exchanged fire over the past six days after Israel launched air strikes which it said were aimed at preventing Iran developing a nuclear weapon. Iranian officials insist the country’s nuclear programme is peaceful.

The disparity in approach has prompted confusion and a growing sense of unfairness, particularly among those questioning why the government acted pre-emptively to protect its own personnel but not ordinary citizens.

It is understood that the FCDO believes the two positions are consistent, citing a distinct duty of care to diplomatic staff.

The decision for family members to leave was based on the view that they are nonessential and more exposed to movement-related risks.

For the wider public, the guidance remains to monitor Israeli government alerts and remain close to shelters where advised.

Ministers say the overall threat level is being closely monitored, with consular teams deployed across Israel and neighbouring countries.

The Foreign Office has said land borders with Jordan and Egypt remain open, and consular teams are in a position to provide assistance to British nationals who choose to leave Israel by land.

But officials maintain that the threshold for advising a general departure has not yet been reached, pointing instead to the continued availability of commercial flights and overland border crossings into Egypt and Jordan.

The prime minister, Keir Starmer, chaired an emergency Cobra meeting on Wednesday to assess the escalating situation in the Middle East and review contingency planning.

A senior government source described the situation as “grave and volatile”, and said ministers were “working round the clock” with international partners to support de-escalation and keep British nationals safe.

“We want to de-escalate and do our first job – keep British nationals safe,” the source said.

More than 1,000 people have now registered their presence with the FCDO. Ministers say this does not indicate that assisted departures are being prepared, but that it enables the UK to better assess who is on the ground and what kind of support may be required if the situation worsens.

While many of those registered are thought to be dual British-Israeli nationals who may not seek UK consular assistance, a smaller number of people have made active requests for support.

The government has deployed extra consular staff to Egypt and Jordan, with rapid deployment teams on standby.

Starmer has said that Donald Trump was interested in de-escalation in the Middle East, saying “nothing” he had heard from the president suggested Washington was poised to get involved.

However the US president told reporters outside the White House on Wednesday that he was considering strikes. “I may do it. I may not do it. I mean, nobody knows what I’m going to do.”