
Air India crash: Families' anger at 'delays' in getting bodies of loved ones
Doctors have been working overtime to collect DNA and dental samples from the 241 victims onboard the plane before releasing their bodies to families, but three days on from the crash, tensions are rising.
Rafiq Abdul Hafiz Memon, who lost four relatives in the incident, said he was not getting any answers from authorities and was 'hassled'.
'We have lost our children… we are not understanding anything. Please help us get information about our children. Tell us when they are going to release their bodies,' Memon said.
Another father was upset about not being able to get the body of his son, Harshad Patel, saying he was told by authorities it would take 72 hours for DNA profiling.
'The authorities are trying to help, but our patience is running out,' he said.
Most bodies in the crash were badly charred and authorities are using dental samples to run identification checks.
Sort: Newest first Oldest first June 14, 2025 8:46 am Dental records of 135 victims used as medics work to identify bodies
Jaishankar Pillai, a forensic dentist, told reporters on Friday they had the dental records of 135 charred victims, which can then be matched through reference to victims' prior dental charts, radiographs or other records.
MORE: Billionaire who played polo with Prince William dies 'after swallowing bee during match'
MORE: British family killed in Air India crash sent one final selfie to waiting relatives
MORE: Passenger on Air India plane before it crashed shares video showing worrying defects

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Wales Online
6 hours ago
- Wales Online
Rassie Erasmus makes shock Wales spying accusation as he tells Warren Gatland 'stop now'
Rassie Erasmus makes shock Wales spying accusation as he tells Warren Gatland 'stop now' The former Wales coach has once again spoken about accusations of spying by the Springboks during the 2021 Lions tour Former Wales head coach Warren Gatland and South Africa's Rassie Erasmus (Image: Getty Images) ) Rassie Erasmus has strongly denied allegations made by Warren Gatland that the Springboks spied on the British and Irish Lions during their 2021 tour of South Africa, labelling the claims as baseless and calling for an end to what he described as 'misinformation". Speaking after South Africa's 42-24 win over Italy at Loftus Versfeld on Saturday, Erasmus, who also went on to accuse Wales themselves of spying in 2021, expressed his frustration over Gatland's accusations, which were detailed in the former Lions boss's latest column for The Telegraph. Gatland alleged that the Springbok camp rented a property overlooking the Lions' training facility and used a long-lens camera to film their preparations. He said suspicions within the Lions setup were confirmed when Lukhanyo Am produced a perfectly-timed hit on Elliot Daly during the opening Test. The former Wales coach also claimed Erasmus was seen on the pitch during a match, disguised as a water carrier, holding a sheet that appeared to include the Lions' attacking plays. 'One of the photographers captured a shot of him holding the paper next to Faf de Klerk,' Gatland wrote. Sign up to Inside Welsh rugby on Substack for the exclusive five-week tour diary from Japan and Australia. Article continues below 'We enlarged the image after the game and it looked like some of our moves and calls were on that sheet.' Gatland said the Lions were so concerned they relocated training sessions indoors to avoid being watched. 'We just didn't know how they could have so much information on us,' he added. Erasmus initially responded with sarcastic posts on social media, but after the win over Italy, he addressed the issue directly and called on Gatland to put an end to the claims. 'It must stop now,' Erasmus said. 'If we're going to go through every bizarre and unlikely story, there'll be a lot more of these kinds of tales. 'I don't want people thinking this kind of thing actually happens in rugby. "There are always strange rumours around training sessions and coaches trying to outsmart each other, but this is different. To make such a serious claim in a newspaper based purely on hearsay is irresponsible. "It just creates unnecessary tension. I'd like us to move on and stop discussing it all together.' Erasmus actually went on to accuse Wales of spying in the autumn of 2021, however Gatland was not head coach at that time. Article continues below The Springboks were forced to evacuate their Cardiff hotel twice overnight before playing Wales and Erasmus has now claimed information had been taken when they returned. Responding to a WalesOnline social media post, Erasmus said: 'I hear from a source from within the Wales [sic] camp that whilst we were evacuated all our notes and plans were photographed and the white board sheets taken. 'We were again forced at around 06h00 for [sic] another evacuation!!'


Daily Mirror
9 hours ago
- Daily Mirror
'I saw my leg hanging after train exploded and realised I'd become amputee'
The most injured female survivor of the 7/7 bombings Martine Wright reflects on the day that changed everything and tells new how she coped with the tragedy and rebuilt her life Martine Wright, from Tring, Hertfordshire, is regarded as the most injured female survivor of the 7/7 London bombings, which claimed the lives of 52 victims. This week marks 20 years since the attack, and now Martine is opening up about losing her legs in the blast, and tells us how she went on to become a Paralympian. Martine, 52, was so badly injured, her siblings were unable to identify her in hospital. But the mum-of-one has come a long way since that catastrophic day, which will be etched in her memory forever. 7 July 2005 started out as a typical day for Martine, who lived and worked in London as a marketing manager. An avid sports fan, she had spent the previous night celebrating the announcement that London would host the 2012 Olympic Games. Waking up with a bit of a sore head after the festivities, she hit the snooze button on her alarm and ended up catching a later Tube train than usual that morning. But within minutes of taking her seat and opening her newspaper, a terrorist struck. Talking us through that devastating day, Martine recalls, 'I distinctly remember going into the tunnel at Liverpool Street and thinking about getting tickets for the Olympics when the explosion happened.' Big white flash 'I don't remember the noise of the explosion, I just recall a big white flash in front of my eyes. It was weird that I had enough time to think, 'What the hell is going on?' I can't believe I had enough time to think that in that nanosecond.' Martine initially thought the Tube train had crashed as she tried to get her bearings among the piercing screams, black smoke and wreckage around her. However, a bomb had exploded just four feet away from her in the first suicide attack on British soil. 'There were all sorts of screams and electrical smells coming from the cables. A gentleman who was sitting next to me as the bomb went off was being electrocuted before my eyes,' she explains. 'I could see thick black smoke, which then started clearing, then I realised my body had been swung around 90 degrees.' She continues, 'The smoke started clearing and I couldn't figure out why I couldn't move. Then I realised my legs were caught up in the wreckage. I looked up and saw one of my white trainers about six feet above my head with blood all over it – and it obviously wasn't attached to my body any more. I didn't realise at that point that I was an amputee.' Martine had lost 80% of her blood and her life was at risk – however a quick- thinking off-duty police officer, called Liz Kenworthy, asked those around her for belts and cardigans to create tourniquets to stem the blood. Liz stayed with Martine for more than an hour until the emergency services could reach them, and she later received an MBE for her heroism. Martine describes Liz as her 'guardian angel' and says she never feared death despite her horrific injuries. 'Liz was running towards danger and refusing to leave when we didn't know if there would be another device, and she stayed with me,' Martine says. 'I thought the blood was coming out of my stomach as well because my guts were all coming out. 'I felt like I was in some sort of film. I was stuck for an hour and a quarter and had to be cut out – and I was the last person to be rescued. While I thought I had fallen unconscious, a firefighter later told me I dug my nails into him, which left a scar, and I was screaming in agony.' After being freed, Martine was rushed to the Royal London Hospital into a room with 22 other survivors called 'Hotel Unknown' as she'd arrived without ID. Her brother and sister didn't recognise her, so when a doctor asked them if anyone else could identify her, Martine's mum arrived on the ward. 'She recognised me by my eyebrows,' Martine recalls. Martine was in a coma for a week and had about 12 operations, including a double leg amputation. She says, 'I'm a product of the hard work and commitment of those NHS doctors and nurses – they're amazing.' Addressing how she began to process what had happened, Martine says, 'I found out 52 people had died and my feelings started changing when I talked to other victims in the hospital who had lost limbs too. 'I've always been a positive person and saw a lot of amputees struggling. I felt I could be positive for them. I wanted to hold their hands and say, 'It's going to be OK.'' Martine, who became a double-amputee at just 33, remained strong until she eventually returned to work and started sobbing at her desk 45 seconds into her day. After a tearful chat with her manager, she decided she had to leave her corporate role and focus on something else. Paralympic success Martine was invited by her physio to an amputee Paralympic potential day, where she quickly fell in love with sitting volleyball and wheelchair tennis. Before long, she was trying out for Great Britain's first sitting volleyball team. Her son, Oscar, was born in July 2009 and by the time he was three months old, she was on the way to the 2012 Paralympics, officially part of Team GB. On the day, she was no longer living in London, and returning to the city was a big moment. She wore a No 7 shirt as a nod to the date that changed everything. She says, 'London will always be in my heart. It's in my blood. But I am glad I live in Hertfordshire with my family now.' Following her Paralympic success, Martine went on to become a motivational speaker, Channel 4 reporter and author. In 2016, she was awarded an MBE for her services to sport. 20-year anniversary It understandably took Martine a long time to go on a Tube train again, but on the 10-year anniversary of the attack, she took the London Underground from Westbourne Grove to Wimbledon with her family. 'I went into the tunnel and my heart started pounding, but I've been back on the Tube since then,' she says. 'The other day, I went to London Bridge and back, but it's a logistical nightmare with prosthetic legs and a wheelchair.' And now, two decades since the bombings, Martine says she wants to do something to mark the anniversary. She's hoping to raise money for charities that have helped her and even teased that she might be climbing a mountain. 'This year is really about reflecting on how kind of lucky I am. It was horrific, but amazing things have come my way as a result of going through that awful day.'


Spectator
10 hours ago
- Spectator
It's time to arm the police
Displays of sheer physical bravery are always impressive. Having been in precisely one real fight in my life, I enormously admire those who put their lives on their line for the rest of us every day, so I almost found myself applauding when I saw last week the police bodycam footage of Inspector Molloy Campbell taking on the drug-crazed sword-wielding murderer Marcus Monzo. Armed only with his extendable baton, Campbell kept Monzo at bay, before other officers eventually subdue him with tasers. Nevertheless, admiration was not my only reaction to that video. It also occurred to me that the situation could have been resolved much more quickly if Campbell and his colleagues were routinely equipped with guns, like the vast majority of police worldwide. Of European countries, only Iceland, Norway and Ireland have unarmed police forces, although there are places, such as France, where certain tiers of law enforcement are sometimes unarmed, at the discretion of local authorities (it is perhaps relevant that Iceland, Norway and Ireland are sparsely populated and between them have a lower population than the London metropolitan area). Monzo had committed two assaults, one of them lethal, before the police arrived on the scene. Constables with guns would not have made a difference to the outcome of those incidents. But four additional people were attacked after the arrival of the police; two police officers and a married couple, whose home he broke into after fighting off initial attempts to detain him. Obviously, no one can say for certain how things might have gone with police able to use firearms to incapacitate Mr Monzo, rather than fiddling around with batons, pepper sprays and tasers, but it doesn't seem wildly speculative to think that the situation might have been resolved in a more satisfactory way. Guns are not a panacea. Sceptics will point, reasonably enough, to surveys suggesting that large numbers of serving police officers would be reluctant to carry firearms. They might note also that such a step could be counter-productive, as criminals increase their own firepower in response. Plausibly we could see a rise in wrongful shootings, which are vanishingly rare in Britain. Some on the right argue that given the current problems within our police forces, it would be highly unwise to give them more power to intimidate the public. All of these points need to be considered carefully. There is, though, one particular objection that I don't find at all persuasive: what you might call the nostalgic argument. This line of thought harks back to a great British tradition of unarmed policing, which sets us apart from the rest of the world. This is not Napoleonic France or Prussia, where armed gendarmeries do the bidding of a centralised and oppressive state. Here the police operate by consent, not force; they are citizens in uniform, happy to give directions to the park or search for a lost dog, and maybe even do a bit of light traffic-directing now and again. The position harks back to Peel and his original nine principles, which were intended to cement law and order while respecting Britain's tradition of personal liberty. And it is undoubtedly a very attractive vision, genuinely grounded in the historical reality of Britain as an unusually peaceful, law-abiding and well-policed country. Unfortunately, however, things have changed. This is reflected in the look of police officers. I'm old enough now that I can remember when coppers on duty wore woolly jumpers and ties, and carried the equipment they needed on a single belt, rather than being weighed down by military-style webbing creaking with all manner of paraphernalia. The 'long peace' of low crime enjoyed by Britain from the last decades of the nineteenth century to around the middle of the twentieth, is well and truly over. In 1951, the last year before the accession of Queen Elizabeth II, there were 214 robberies in the entire Metropolitan Police area, which then contained around eight million people. In the year after her death, 2023, the Met recorded over 30,000 robberies – for a population that had only risen by a million or so people overall since 1951. Almost all forms of violent crime are massively higher than they were 60 or 70 years ago, even if they have declined somewhat from their modern peak in the 1990s. The murder rate has increased by 50 per cent since 1960, and the vast improvements in trauma medicine in the last half century mask, to some extent, the increase in would-be murderous assaults. There is an ongoing, if seemingly diminished, threat from rampage terror attacks, and for various reasons there are a lot more unstable or mentally ill people roaming the streets of our big cities, and their rare but potentially horrific outbursts of violence can be hard for police to subdue using their current equipment. There is no irrefutable argument for giving the police firearms. For all our problems, Britain does remain peaceful by global standards. Perhaps it would be a very bad idea to put guns in the hands of our current arrogant politicised forces, thus enabling more effective intimidation of people who criticise the leadership of their local school or say they're not too keen on Islam or want to pray quietly near an abortion clinic. But the British social fabric is deteriorating – we cannot be complacent about the serious challenges that the forces of law and order might face in coming decades. Even if we don't want to let the current breed of hatchet-faced commissars have pistols, we must not rule out arming reformed and renewed British police forces. The Monzo incident is far from the only occasion in recent years when a dangerous threat to the public could have been subdued far more quickly and safely, if the first police responders had their own guns.