Star Metro - London-bound plane with 242 on board crashes into doctors' housing in India

An AFP journalist saw people recovering bodies and firefighters trying to douse the smouldering wreckage after the Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner hit buildings during lunchtime.

"The tragedy in Ahmedabad has stunned and saddened us. It is heartbreaking beyond words," Prime Minister Narendra Modi said after Air India's flight 171 crashed after takeoff.

City police commissioner GS Malik told AFP there "appears to be no survivor in the crash".

Rescue teams supported by the military had "found 204 bodies", he said, with people aboard the plane and those on the ground among the dead.

The AFP journalist saw a section of the plane lying on the ground and a building ablaze, with thick black smoke billowing into the air.

"One half of the plane crashed into the residential building where doctors lived with their families," said Krishna, a doctor who did not give his full name.

"The nose and front wheel landed on the canteen building where students were having lunch," he said.

Krishna said he saw "about 15 to 20 burnt bodies", while he and his colleagues rescued around 15 students.

India's civil aviation authority said there were 242 people aboard, including two pilots and 10 cabin crew.

Air India said there were 169 Indian passengers, 53 British, seven Portuguese, and a Canadian on board the flight bound for London Gatwick.

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the scenes from the crash were "devastating", while the country's King Charles III said he was "desperately shocked".

- 'Devastating' -

The plane issued a mayday call and "crashed immediately after takeoff" outside the airport perimeter, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation said.

Ahmedabad, the main city of India's Gujarat state, is home to around eight million people and the busy airport is surrounded by densely packed residential areas.

"When we reached the spot there were several bodies lying around and firefighters were dousing the flames," resident Poonam Patni told AFP.

"Many of the bodies were burned," she said.

The AFP journalist saw medics using a cart to load bodies into an ambulance, while a charred metal bed frame stood surrounded by burnt wreckage.

A photograph published by India's Central Industrial Security Force, a national security agency, showed the tail of the plane jutting from a building.

The plane came down in an area between a hospital and the city's Ghoda Camp neighbourhood.

The airport was shut, with all flights "suspended until further notice", its operator said.

US planemaker Boeing said it was in touch with Air India and stood "ready to support them" over the incident, which a source close to the case said was the first crash for a 787 Dreamliner.

Air India ordered 100 more Airbus planes last year after a giant contract in 2023 for 470 aircraft -- 250 Airbus and 220 Boeing.

The airline's chairman, Natarajan Chandrasekaran, said an emergency centre had been set up with a support team for families seeking information.

"Our thoughts and deepest condolences are with the families and loved ones of all those affected by this devastating event," he said.

India has suffered a series of fatal air crashes, including a 1996 disaster when two jets collided mid-air over New Delhi, killing nearly 350 people.

India's airline industry has boomed in recent years with Willie Walsh, director general of the International Air Transport Association (IATA), last month calling it "nothing short of phenomenal".

The growth of its economy has made India and its 1.4 billion people the world's fourth-largest air market -- domestic and international -- with IATA projecting it will become the third biggest within the decade.

India's domestic air passenger traffic reached a milestone last year by "surpassing 500,000 passengers in a single day", according to India's Ministry of Civil Aviation.

L.Pelletier--SMC