On June 23, 1985, Air India Flight 182 disappeared off air traffic control radar near the coast of Ireland with 329 passengers and crew bound for Delhi.
As initial Irish search and rescue efforts turned to the grim task of recovery, news of the Air India disaster was just reaching a small family on Dublin Street in New Westminster, B.C. For them, the fate of an aunt and uncle and a young son waiting for them at home in India, began unfolding live on television. For the people of Cork, however, the Irish county closest to where the wreckage of the plane now lay scattered across the ocean, the tragedy was unfolding before their very eyes.
“People didn’t really know initially why this had happened,” says Jürgen Simpson, a Dublin-born composer and Air India researcher. “In many ways the initial response of people here in Ireland was really just a response to experiencing that degree of loss off the Irish coastline.”
In 1985, the cause was almost unheard of. That morning, as it travelled through Irish airspace at an altitude of 31,000 feet, Air India Flight 182 was destroyed by a bomb. All 329 Canadians, Indians, Americans and Britons on board were killed, including 82 children. Some were killed instantly, others died of hypoxia (lack of oxygen), while still more died of drowning in the sea below. Entire families were lost in the disaster. And, earlier the same day, a second bomb meant for another Air India flight went off prematurely at Narita International Airport in Tokyo, killing two baggage handlers and bringing the total death toll of the attack to 331.
03/11/15 Kelsey Klassen/Westender/Vancouver Courier
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As initial Irish search and rescue efforts turned to the grim task of recovery, news of the Air India disaster was just reaching a small family on Dublin Street in New Westminster, B.C. For them, the fate of an aunt and uncle and a young son waiting for them at home in India, began unfolding live on television. For the people of Cork, however, the Irish county closest to where the wreckage of the plane now lay scattered across the ocean, the tragedy was unfolding before their very eyes.
“People didn’t really know initially why this had happened,” says Jürgen Simpson, a Dublin-born composer and Air India researcher. “In many ways the initial response of people here in Ireland was really just a response to experiencing that degree of loss off the Irish coastline.”
In 1985, the cause was almost unheard of. That morning, as it travelled through Irish airspace at an altitude of 31,000 feet, Air India Flight 182 was destroyed by a bomb. All 329 Canadians, Indians, Americans and Britons on board were killed, including 82 children. Some were killed instantly, others died of hypoxia (lack of oxygen), while still more died of drowning in the sea below. Entire families were lost in the disaster. And, earlier the same day, a second bomb meant for another Air India flight went off prematurely at Narita International Airport in Tokyo, killing two baggage handlers and bringing the total death toll of the attack to 331.
03/11/15 Kelsey Klassen/Westender/Vancouver Courier
