Indian man lost 16 relatives in Air India crash

An Indian man lost 16 family members who were traveling home to attend the funeral of another relative in the Dubai-Mangalore crash of an Air India airliner, the Khaleej Times reported on Sunday.

Samir Sheikh lost his wife, two children, uncle and 12 other relatives in Saturday’s crash, in which only eight of the 166 people on board survived.

The 16 people were travelling to India to attend the funeral of Sheikh’s grandmother who died on Friday, Khaleej Times said.

Sheikh, a Saudi Arabia-based businessman, was in Mumbai and waiting to travel to Mangalore at the time of the crash.

The Air India Express Boeing 737-800 careered off the “table-top” runway after touching down at Mangalore’s Bajpe airport and ploughed into a forested gorge, bursting into flames.

AFP