The aspiring chef who suddenly collapsed and died before taking off on a Qantas flight in Australia was at peace in her final moments, the “haunted” passenger seated next to her during the tragedy revealed.
Manpreet Kaur, the 24-year-old culinary student studying in Melbourne, was on the Qantas Airways plane bound for Delhi, India where she had planned to visit family she hadn’t seen in four years.
Ravinder Singh, who had been visiting family in Australia, boarded the plane after Kaur and first noticed her when he was taking his seat.
“I was sitting next to her on the Qantas flight from Melbourne to Delhi and was the last person to talk to her,” Singh told NewsAU.
“When I boarded the plane, she was already seated in the aisle. I was in the window, so I asked if she could please get up so I could occupy my seat,” the passenger added.
Singh saw Kaur, who was from northern India’s Dharampura, looking through pictures on her phone as they waited for the plane to begin rolling back from the gate.
“I noticed that she began scrolling through photos on her mobile phone and stopped at a photograph of an elderly couple,” Singh said. “I asked if they were her parents. She smiled and nodded and kept staring at it.”
When the plane began moving towards the runway, Singh said Kaur, who was buckled in the seat, had put her phone down and leaned forward resting her head on the seat in front of her.
“As the plane was preparing for takeoff, I wanted to alert her to sit upright,” he said.
Before he could alert her, the plane “jerked” causing Kaur’s head to move towards Singh, and the retired army officer realized something was wrong and alerted the flight crew.
Singh told a flight attendant that Kaur “did not seem very well” while the crew checked the woman’s pulse before they attempted to “revive” her.
“The reaction of the cabin crew was very commendable,” he said, recalling that a medical crew rushed Kaur off the plane.
Singh remains haunted by the tragic event weeks later but wants to ensure Kaur’s parents that she “left the world peacefully.”
“The incident has been etched in my memory for life,” he told the outlet. “It is very difficult to digest that a young girl with whom you were just interacting with has passed away in front of your eyes.
“Her innocent face stills haunts me and I want her parents to know she loved them a lot. She left this world peacefully looking at their photograph, Singh added. “My heart breaks for her family who would have been looking forward to seeing her after a long time.”
A post-mortem test revealed Kaur had died from tuberculosis, an infectious disease that mostly affects the lungs, according to a report.
Kaur’s cousin and roommate revealed that the aspiring chef had unknowingly been battling the bacteria-causing respiratory illness for a few months and her health had deteriorated in her final days.
“She had difficulty talking and during that last week she had no energy to do anything and was just lying in bed,” Kuldeep Kaur told the Daily Mail.
Kaur’s body can not leave Australia because she died from tuberculosis, forcing her parents to apply for visas so they can fly to the country and attend their daughter’s funeral.
A GoFundMe was created to help Kaur’s family following her death.
“Our dear friend Manpreet left us too soon, leaving a void in our lives that can never be filled. As we grieve her passing, we want to come together to honor her memory and support her family in their time of need,” the fundraiser reads.
Victoria’s Department of Health said it had begun limited contact tracing the following day, and anyone identified as a potential risk would be notified.
With Post wires.
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