Rescue teams worked into the night at the smoldering scene of an Air India plane crash that killed 158 people Saturday after the jet overshot a runway in southern India, crashed into a ravine and burst into flames, officials said.
As darkness descended, workers used portable lights to pull charred bodies out of the wreckage outside Mangalore International Airport.
All but eight bodies have been recovered, the civil aviation ministry said.
Eight of the 166 people on board Air India Flight IX-812 survived the crash and were taken to hospitals, where most were in good condition, CNN-IBN reported.The Boeing 737 took off from Dubai in the United Arab Emirates and crashed while trying to make its scheduled landing in Mangalore at 6:30 a.m. Saturday (9 p.m. ET Friday), Air India spokesman Anup Srivastava said.
India's civil aviation minister Praful Patel said an investigation was underway but reasons for the crash would not be known until the flight data and voice data recorders have been recovered. Emergency workers were attempting to cool the fiery wreckage Saturday night to keep the data intact.
The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board announced Saturday that it will send a team to India to assist in the investigation.
The Air India jet touched down on an 8,000-foot runway -- 2,000 feet longer than the old runway and more than sufficient for the Boeing 737, Patel said. The runway has been operational since 2006.
Some of the survivors recounted their harrowing tales for CNN-IBN.
Ummerfarook Mohammed said the cabin quickly filled with smoke after the jet skidded off the runway and hit a boundary wall. The impact created a hole in the plane's body, he said, through which he crawled out and ran for his life.
Nearby villagers carted him in a rickshaw to a hospital.
A medical student said she escaped from the plane but that she then free-fell until she was snagged by a tree, where rescuers found her.
Some of those flying back from Dubai were among the millions of Indians who work as laborers in Persian Gulf states.
Mangalore's airport was "technically certified" by the country's civil aviation regulator.
Patel said weather conditions were good -- calm winds, no rain and good visibility of 6 kilometers -- and both the pilot and co-pilot were experienced and had landed many times before at the Mangalore airport. They did not report any problems before landing the plane, India's civil aviation ministry said.
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