Ruangsak Loychusak: Why 'lucky 11 A' survivor Vishwash Kumar Ramesh's seat number gave Thai celebrity 'goosebumps'

Thai Airways Flight TG261, an Airbus A310-204 type wide-body aircraft, stalled and crashed into a swamp while trying to land at Surat Thani Airport on 11 December 1998. One hundred and one of the 146 occupants on board the plane perished in the incident, and the tragedy remained the second-deadliest plane crash in Thailand in terms of lives lost.

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The Thai Airways Flight 261 tragedy came into the spotlight once again in the backdrop of the Ahmedabad Air India air crash. Ruangsak Loychusak, a 47-year-old Thai singer, was the reason for the almost two-decade-old incident returning to the news. Loychusak, one of the fliers who survived the crash, revealed that he occupied seat number 11A in the ill-fated aircraft — the same seat number as that of Vishwas Kumar Ramesh, the lone survivor of the London-bound Air India flight.

 

Loychusak, one of the survivors of the crash, said he was seated in 11A on the ill-fated aircraft — the same seat number as Vishwash Kumar Ramesh, the sole survivor of the London-bound Air India flight. He reportedly said he had "goosebumps" when he learnt that the sole survivor’s seat number was 11A. Ruangsak Loychusak no longer held a boarding pass or ticket to support his claim, but news reports from 1998 could prove he was not bluffing, he reportedly told the Daily Mail.

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Forty-year-old British passenger Vishwash Kumar Ramesh recalled that the section of the aircraft where he was seated remained grounded and did not crash onto the roof of the building, unlike the rest of the AI171 flight. “When I saw the exit, I thought I could come out. I tried, and I did. Maybe the people who were on the other side of the plane weren’t able to," the Leicester-based man said.

 

"I could still remember the taste of the water in the swamp the plane crashed into... I had difficulty flying for 10 years after the crash. I avoided speaking to anyone and always stared outside the window, blocking anyone from closing it to maintain my sense of safety," he told the Daily Mail.

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Airbus A310-204

The Airbus A310 was a medium- to long-range twin-engined wide-body jet airliner. According to Wikipedia, they were "commonly marketed as an introduction to wide-body operations for airlines based in developing countries." A total of 255 A310s were delivered between 1983 and 1988. As of January 2025, only 33 A310s remained in service, and only eight among them were passenger aircraft. The model was replaced by Airbus A330-200s, reports showed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

India