Would EU261 apply on a ticket from the US to India?

It sounds like they were in quite a large party (11 people) which may have made rebookings etc less straightforward.

If the flight that went "up in smoke" three months ago referred to was the A330 with an engine fire after a bird strike at Istanbul, the aircraft landed safely and everyone disembarked normally.

It is always a pain when things go wrong, but it doesn't sound like safety was compromised in either incident.