A 40th anniversary memorial of the Air India Disaster will take place in Ahakista at 8am on Monday, June 23rd.
The annual service is organised by Cork County Council, and the local community, on behalf of the families of those who lost their lives in the tragic incident.
On June 23rd 1985, Air India Flight 182 exploded off the south coast of Ireland killing everyone on board.
In addition to honouring the memory of the 329 who died in that tragedy, mourners will also remember the 241 people who died on June 12th last, 40 seconds after Air India Flight 171 lifted off from the airport at Ahmedabad, leaving just one survivor.
Flight AI171 issued a Mayday call moments after taking off from Ahmedabad’s Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel international airport. It reached just 650ft before crashing into a medical college complex.
Only one of the 242 people on board survived, with reports of at least 29 people on the ground also killed.
The memorial service in Ahakista Monday 23rd will begin with a minute’s silence before Christian and Hindu readings and the laying of wreaths.
Five years ago, the occasion was marked in real time, across three continents, as three nations joined together to remember the departed.
On this, the 40th anniversary, people will gather at the specially created memorial garden which features a sundial dedicated to those who died on board the flight from Toronto in Canada to Delhi in India.
On that day, a bomb in the luggage hold on board the Kanishka – as the Boeing 747 was known – exploded and the jumbo jet, which was 31,000 ft over the Atlantic off Cork’s south west coast, was decimated.
But each and every year, the relatives and the community join in the spirit of the Canadian motto ‘Je me souviens,’ which means, ‘I remember.’
