'I walked out of rubble': Survivor on how he escaped Air India wreckage
"I managed to unbuckle myself, used my leg to push through that opening, and crawled out," Vishwashkumar Ramesh told Indian state media DD News.
Ramesh, 40, was in seat 11A on the London-bound Boeing 787 flight when it went down shortly after take off in Ahmedabad, western India on Thursday.
Air India said all other passengers and crew were killed — including 169 Indian nationals and 52 British nationals. More than 200 bodies have been recovered so far, though it is unclear how many were passengers and how many were from the ground.
Speaking from his hospital bed, Ramesh said the lights inside the aircraft "started flickering" moments after take off.
Within five to 10 seconds, it felt like the plane was "stuck in the air", he said.
"The lights started flickering green and white...suddenly slammed into a building and exploded."
The Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner crashed into a building used as accommodation for doctors at the Byramjee Jeejeebhoy Medical College and Civil Hospital.
But Ramesh, from Leicester, said the section he was sitting in landed near the ground and did not make contact with the building.
"When the door broke and I saw there was some space, I tried to get out of there and I did.
"No one could have got out from the opposite side, which was toward the wall, because it crashed there."
Video shared on social media showed Ramesh walking toward an ambulance with smoke billowing in the background.
He told the Indian broadcaster he could not believe that he came out of the wreckage alive.
"I saw people dying in front of my eyes — the air hostesses, and two people I saw near me," he said.
"For a moment, I felt like I was going to die too, but when I opened my eyes and looked around, I realized I was alive.
"I still can't believe how I survived. I walked out of the rubble."
Dr Dhaval Gameti, who treated Ramesh, said he was "disorientated, with multiple injuries all over his body", but that he appears to be "out of danger".
On Friday morning, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited the crash site before making his way to the hospital to meet injured people including Ramesh, and the families of victims.
Ramesh's brother, Ajay, was also onboard the plane.
Their other brother, Nayan Kumar Ramesh, told BBC News on Thursday from outside their family home in Leicester: "When he [Vishwashkumar] called us, he was just more worried about [Ajay]... that's all he cares about at the moment."
Ramesh, a businessman who was born in India but has lived in the UK since 2003, has a wife and four-year-old son. — BBC
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