While the entire country is shocked by the crash of Air India aircraft in Ahmedabad, the accident reinforced the bitter memories associated with another aircraft accident of a resident of Parbhani in Maharashtra 32 years ago, in which 55 people lost their lives.
Former Parbhani Mayor Vasant Chavan told a news channel that he survived the tragedy in 1993 because he was sitting near the cockpit, not in the rear where there was a fuel tank.
He was riding on the Indian Airlines plane that flew from Chiklathana Airport in the then Aurangabad district (now Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar) on 26 April 1993.
Aurangabad-Mumbai flight 491’s landing gear collided with a truck on the road while flying at the end of the runway and then hit the high-tension electric wires before crashed into a field, causing three pieces and caught fire. Out of 112 passengers aboard the aircraft, 55 died.
Chavan told a news channel, “I and Congress leader Ramprasad Bordikar were going to Mumbai for Sharad Pawar’s program. We did not surely know whether we would get air tickets or not, but a family of Parbhani canceled their tickets and so we got a place. I was lucky that I was sitting close to the cockpit. ”
Chavan said, “Bordikar and I were offered the back seat, but we liked to sit near the cockpit.” We survived, but the people sitting in the rear died scorched in the fire. ”