THE Air India crash pilot was hailed a hero by locals yesterday after he diverted his doomed jet at the last second to avoid their apartment block.
All 18 families in the three-storey building under the flight path are convinced they owe their lives to Captain Sumeet Sabharwal — whose Boeing 787 Dreamliner was heading for them when it suffered a loss of engine thrust after take-off.
But with feet to spare, he managed to divert the plane carrying 242 passengers and crew towards a patch of grassland.
The locals raced from their homes in Ahmedabad when a fireball from 90 tons of aviation fuel ignited as the plane slammed into the ground next to a medical college.
The aircraft obliterated the top two floors of a disused four-storey military building.
But the fire tore through the college’s hostel, killing dozens of students and staff who were having lunch in the canteen.