7 killed as air ambulance crashes in Jharkhand’s Chatra en route to Delhi

All seven persons on board an air ambulance were killed after the aircraft crashed near Simaria in Jharkhand’s Chatra district on Monday evening, officials said.

The Beechcraft C90 aircraft, operated by Redbird Airways Pvt Ltd, was en route to Delhi from Ranchi when it went down shortly after takeoff. According to the Deputy Commissioner of Chatra, Keerthishree G, the aircraft took off from Ranchi at 7.11 pm and went missing around 7.30 pm before crashing in the Bariatu Panchayat area of Simaria, deep inside a forest.

SDPO Shubham Khandelwal said the bodies of all seven persons on board have been retrieved. The deceased were identified as Captain Vivek Vikas Bhagat, Captain Savrajdeep Singh, Sanjay Kumar, Dr Vikas Kumar Gupta, Sachin Kumar Mishra, Archana Devi, and Dhuru Kumar.

Anant Sinha, CEO of Devkamal Hospital in Ranchi, said the air ambulance was arranged for a 41-year-old burn patient, Sanjay Kumar from Latehar district, who had sustained 65 per cent burn injuries and was being shifted to Delhi for advanced treatment.

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The Directorate General of Civil Aviation said the aircraft lost communication and radar contact with Kolkata around 100 nautical miles southeast of Varanasi. An investigation has been launched, and a team from the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau has been dispatched to the crash site.