An incident that can be termed as a nightmare, around 240 passengers on an Air India flight from Amritsar to New Delhi on 19 April experienced heavy turbulence, resulting in injuries to three people and causing a window panel inside the aircraft fall off mid-flight.
A 50-second-long video purportedly of the incident has surfaced on social media. In the video, an air hostess can be seen trying to fix the window panel that came off and pacifying an elderly woman passenger seated on that particular window seat.
Besides Air India, aviation regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) and Aircraft Accident Investigation Board (AAIB) are probing the incident, which happened on 19 April soon after the flight took off from Amristar, one of the officials said.
The duration of Amristar-Delhi flight is about 35 minutes and on April 19, the flight was full with over 240 passengers, another official said. As per media reports, the turbulence continued for around 10-12 minutes.
The officials said the flight experienced turbulence soon after take-off when the altitude was around 15,000 feet due to bad weather.
At least three passengers had minor injuries and were given first aid after landing at the Delhi airport. Later, they took their connecting flights for onward journey, they added.
As per NDTV news reports, the pilot of the Air India Boeing 787 Dreamliner that was hit by severe air turbulence said that he had “never seen anything like this ever”. The incident has been described as a “freak kind of severe turbulence”.