1953 Air India accident near Delhi
Douglas DC-3/C-47A-25-DK · The 1953 Air India accident near Delhi occurred on 9 May 1953
From Indira Gandhi International Airport (DEL) to Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport (BOM)
Event
- Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
- Accident
- Event fatalities
- 18 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- Unknown
- Occupants
- Unknown
- Survivors
- 0
- InjuriesFatal: death within 30 days. Serious: over 48 hours in hospital within a week, most broken bones, severe bleeding, nerve or organ damage, or serious burns. Minor: anything less. Glossary
- Unknown
- OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
- Airline
Douglas DC-3/C-47A-25-DK
- Aircraft type
- Douglas DC-3
- Category
- Airplane · from aircraft type
- RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
- VT-AUD
- Operator
- Air India
- Onboard fatalities
- 18
- Route
- From Indira Gandhi International Airport (DEL)To Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport (BOM)
Cause areas
- Personnel issues › Action/decision
- Personnel issues › Experience/knowledge
From the investigation findings the Wikipedia article reports, sorted into the NTSB's cause areas with AI assistance.
Not plotted · Not plotted: the Wikipedia article gives no coordinates, and its site names no town or airport that matches exactly.
From the Wikipedia article
The 1953 Air India accident near Delhi occurred on 9 May 1953. On that day a Douglas DC-3/C-47A-25-DK of Air India, which was to operate a domestic scheduled flight from Delhi to Bombay with a scheduled intermediate stop in Ahmedabad, crashed a few minutes after takeoff on the first leg, killing all 18 occupants of the aircraft.
Accident sequence
The flight was conducted at night. The pilots received clearance for takeoff from runway 09 of Delhi-Palam Airport. Takeoff took place at 01:23 local time. When the aircraft had climbed to an altitude of about 500 feet (approx. 152 metres), the first officer flew a sharp right turn in which it assumed an excessive bank angle, as a result of which a stall occurred. The aircraft crashed into wasteland about two kilometres southeast of the airport at 01:28 local time and exploded on impact. All 18 occupants were killed.
Investigation and cause
Cause
The cause of the accident was assumed to be an error of judgement by the additional pilot who was flying the aircraft at the time of the accident. Because of the low altitude, he had been unable to recover the aircraft from its abnormal attitude in time. The low experience of the captain on the aircraft type flown was given as an indirect cause of the accident.
Translated into English with AI assistance from the German Wikipedia article “Flugunfall der Air India bei Delhi 1953” (revision 241739143, retrieved 2026-09-19) by its authors, under CC BY-SA 4.0. Extracted as plain text: references, tables, images and some sections are left out; the translation may contain errors, and long articles were cut to their first 700 words. Read the article
Sources
German Wikipedia article: Flugunfall der Air India bei Delhi 1953
- Translation
- Into English with AI assistance; names of linked operators and aircraft types from Wikidata. It may contain errors.
- Revision
- 241739143 · 2024-01-31 · retrieved 2026-09-19
- Wikidata
- Q106610737
- Licence
- Text CC BY-SA 4.0, by the article's authors; Wikidata CC0; town positions GeoNames (CC BY 4.0)
Where each value comes from
- Record
- de Wikipedia article "Flugunfall der Air India bei Delhi 1953" (page 11741784, revision 241739143), translated into English with AI assistance
- Date
- Wikipedia infobox: date
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site
- Map position
- none
- Aircraft, operator and route
- Wikipedia infobox: aircraft type, registration, operator, origin and destination; route airports from the linked airport articles' Wikidata codes (OurAirports)
- Operation
- "scheduled flight" in the article's opening paragraph
- Fatalities
- Wikipedia infobox: aircraft fatalities
- Ground fatalities
- not stated in the Wikipedia infobox
- Summary
- Wikipedia article lead
Source notes (1)
- Wikipedia · Facts from the German Wikipedia article's infobox, translated into English with AI assistance, not checked against an investigation report. Independent review pending.