Bengaluru woman dies in flight while returning from the US

The pilots had alerted the airport officials before the Air India flight landed at around 7:30am on Thursday.

A 69-year-old Bengaluru woman died midair while returning home from the United States.

Sources at the Kempegowda International Airport in Bengaluru said that the woman had boarded an Air India flight (AI176) from San Francisco, which was the longest direct flight of the airline from the US to Bengaluru- with her son on Tuesday, a report in The Times of India said.

“There was a medical emergency midair around 11pm on Wednesday. The crew provided all assistance, but the passenger died on board,” an Air India official at the airport said.

The woman had raised a complain of feeling uneasy on the flight and as per sources, died due to natural causes.

The pilots had alerted the airport officials before the flight landed at around 7:30am on Thursday. As per airport sources, the woman's body was taken in an ambulance to the airport hospital, before it was transferred to a government hospital for an autopsy.

A similar incident had occurred in 2021, when a passenger had died onboard an Air India flight which was returning to Delhi from Newark in the United States. The deceased passenger was from the US and was travelling with his wife.

The medical emergency on the flight caused a delay of more than three hours.

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