Distraught kin try to identify bodies in India plane crash (Feature)

May 23, 2010, 11:56 GMT

New Delhi - Two families claimed the same charred body in the south-western city of Mangalore Sunday amid heart-wrenching scenes at a hospital mortuary a day after 158 people died in a plane crash.

Air India's flight 812 from Dubai overshot the runway while landing Saturday and plunged into a gorge killing all but eight of the 166 people on board. Many of the 158 bodies recovered from the site were charred beyond recognition as the plane had burst into flames.

Dazed and grieving relatives and friends thronged the state-run Wenlock Hospital in Mangalore through the night, trying to identify their loved ones, PTI news agency reported.

Television channels showed tearful family members, wearing masks, moving in and out of the mortuary.

A team of DNA experts had arrived in Mangalore and were taking samples to help identify the victims. Hospital authorities said it could take up to a week to identify all the dead.

Two families from the southern state of Kerala claimed the same body, but authorities said it would be handed over only after a DNA test, PTI reported.

Several of the victims belonged to Kasaragod and Kannur districts of Kerala.

They were largely workers in the Gulf countries who were returning for weddings and funerals, or to spend their children's summer vacations at their family homes.

Siddique Sulaiman, a salesman based in the United Arab Emirates, was on his way to attend his father's last rites in Kasargod when he died in the crash.

Sameer A Shaikh, a resident of Saudi Arabia, lost 16 members of his family in the crash, all on their way to attend his grandmother's funeral in Mangalore. Shaikh himself had taken an earlier flight to Mumbai.

Distraught relatives were requesting hospital authorities to expedite the DNA identification process.

'We want the DNA process to begin immediately so that we can be free of this unbearable agony,' PTI quoted cabin crew member Mohammed Ali's father, who flew in from the central Indian town of Bhopal, as saying.

Doctors and nurses were focusing on conducting post mortems so that the bodies could be preserved.

'A total of 104 bodies have been identified and handed over to relatives. Fifty-four bodies are yet to be identified,' Karnataka's director general of police Ajai Kumar Singh said.

Mangalore, a coastal city in India's Karnataka state is located near the border with Kerala.

An Air India representative said arrangements had been made to provide coffins free of charge to family members to transport the bodies after identification.

Air India has also attached a member of its humanitarian team called angels of Air India, the airline's emergency response coordinator Harpreet Singh said at a press briefing in Mumbai.

The angels would assist family members to reach Mangalore, help accommodate them in hotels, assist them to identify the bodies and take them back.