A British woman narrowly missed boarding the doomed Air India flight by just 10 minutes because she was stuck in traffic on the way to the airport in what she described as “totally a miracle.”
Bhoomi Chauhan, 28, traveled about 125 miles to India’s Ahmedabad Airport to get to seat 36G on Flight AI171 to London Gatwick Airport on Thursday — but her taxi got stuck in city traffic, causing her to arrive at 12:20 p.m., just 10 minutes after the boarding process began, she told the BBC Friday
Despite having checked-in online, the Bristol resident was turned away by airline staff, who prevented her from taking her seat on the Boeing 787, which crashed into a residential neighborhood killing 241 people on board and more on the ground just moments after taking off.
“This is totally a miracle for me,” Chauhan, an administrative studies student who was vacationing in India, told the outlet.
She recalled feeling “angry” and “dejected” after missing the flight after traveling from Ankleshwar.
“We got very angry with our driver and left the airport in frustration,” Chauhan said.
“I was very disappointed. When I missed the flight, I was dejected. Only thing that I had in mind was, ‘If I had started a little early, I would have boarded the plane.’”
“We left the airport and stood at a place to drink tea and after a while, before leaving … we were talking to the travel agent about how to get a refund for the ticket,” she said.
“There, I got the call that the plane had gone down.”
Flight AI171 took off from Ahmedabad Airport as scheduled Thursday afternoon local time but crashed roughly 30 seconds into the flight after struggling to gain altitude.
The Boeing jet bound for London went down in a residential neighborhood of the western Indian metropolis, which is home to roughly 5 million people.
The fateful flight produced another miracle with a lone survivor from the plane walking out of the wreckage.
British national Vishwash Kumar Ramesh, 40, escaped the rubble of the devastating crash by crawling out of an emergency door as one of his brothers lay dead just a few feet away.
Dozens more were killed and injured on the ground.
Officials said the 241 victims on board the Air India flight included 217 adults and 11 children — 169 Indian nationals, 53 Brits, seven Portuguese nationals and one Canadian, Air India said.
The cause of the crash is currently under investigation.
