As cardiac surgeon Dr Apurva Patel and his wife Kesha boarded their connecting flight from Dubai to Ahmedabad on Thursday evening, they carried more than luggage. They carried the weight of what could have been.

On June 12, an Air India Dreamliner crashed shortly after takeoff from Ahmedabad, slamming into the Atulyam Hostel of BJ Medical College. The crash killed 241 people onboard and at least 39 students on the ground, many of them medical students who were having lunch at the hostel mess when the aircraft tore through the building.

Dr Patel, who had been in Canada at the time, is an alumnus of the same medical college. His 19-year-old son, Nisarg, is currently studying medicine there and is a regular at the very mess that was reduced to rubble.

Stay up to date with the latest news. Follow KT on WhatsApp Channels.

“That mess serves good food. Students prefer it over other options,” he told Khaleej Times during a transit stop in Dubai, where he briefly visited friends Dhaval Mehta and Vaishali in Business Bay. “My son eats there almost every day. He could have been there that day. The only reason he wasn’t was because he had an exam.”

'Relief to hear his voice'

The call from Canada to check on his son was one of the hardest he’s ever made. “Friends and well-wishers started calling me. I immediately rang him. It was an immense relief to hear his voice.”

Nisarg.

For Nisarg, though, survival has come at a heavy emotional cost.

“He’s numb with shock,” Dr. Patel said. “He lost friends, batchmates — kids he studied with. He hasn’t been able to process it.”

Although Dr. Patel never lived in the Atulyam Hostel — it was built years after he graduated — the campus remains deeply personal. The family now lives around seven kilometres from the crash site, and Dr. Patel practices at Epic Hospital in Ahmedabad.

“Seeing images of that place reduced to rubble and smoke… it’s surreal,” he said.

With their daughter Saiprashanti.

Air India Flight AI 171 had barely cleared 600 feet after takeoff en route to London Gatwick when it suffered a sudden failure and veered off course. The aircraft crashed into the hostel complex, making it one India’s deadliest aviation disaster in more than a decade the first fatal accident involving a Boeing 787 Dreamliner.

As the Patels return to Ahmedabad for the first time since the tragedy, they know the road home won’t feel the same.

“I’ll be passing the site on my way from the airport,” Dr. Patel said. “I don’t know what it’ll be like to see it in person. That place meant something to so many of us.”

UAE businessman pledges Dh2.5 million for families of medical student victims in Air India crash India plane crash: Pilot Clive Kunder cremated in Mumbai Air India crash: UAE residents demand 'lucky' seat 11A after passenger survives Video: Air India plane crash's lone survivor breaks down at brother's funeral