Qatar Airways pilot dies mid-flight

Doha: Qatar Airways diverted its Manila-Doha flight to Kuala Lumpur early yesterday after the pilot suffered a massive heart attack on board and later died.
The co-pilot flew the plane (Flight No QR645), with roughly 260 passengers on board, to Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) for emergency landing.
He requested the KLIA authorities for permission to land after the pilot complained of chest pain, and urged that a medical team be kept ready so that the pilot could be provided medical care.
But the medical team declared the pilot dead after the flight landed at KLIA. The passengers on board were not told about the pilot’s condition, it is learnt.
The deceased, Ajay Kukreja, was an Indian in his early forties. The flight took off from Manila’s Ninoy Aquino International Airport early yesterday.
Qatar Airways, which has an office in Kuala Lumpur, changed the entire crew of the plane and it took off for Doha at 1.15pm (local time) and landed here at around 3.37pm (Qatar time), more than four-and-a-half hours behind schedule.
Kukreja’s body was taken to Serdang Hospital in Kuala Lumpur for a post-mortem and reports said he had died of cardiac arrest.
He reportedly suffered a heart attack roughly an hour after the flight had left Manila, and had had a light breakfast a little after take-off.
According to sources close to his family here, he had no past history of heart problems. However, he was asthmatic and always carried an inhaler.
His body is being flown to Mumbai directly from Kuala Lumpur later this evening, while Qatar Airways is also said to be making arrangements to fly his grieving widow and two children to India’s financial capital.
Kukreja hailed from Delhi and had married a Goan, but his parents live in Mumbai. He has been living in Doha — working with Qatar Airways — for five years.
His widow teaches in a nursery here while his children, a 13-year-old boy and a 10-year-old girl, are in school.
14/10/10 The Peninsula, Qatar

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Categories: Foreign Oct 2010, Safety Oct 2010