Air India had a 787 flight in 2023 that had to return to its airport after an engine failure. The failure was determined to be because of poor maintenance. The flight was between Mumbai and London. Also of note: India's aviation regulator only has half the staff it is supposed to have. It's a sad day when India runs out of people . . . Air India Dreamliner made emergency landing after 2023 engine failure
Folks in the west don’t understand how almost comically corrupt India is, in everything. Literally everything. I spent some time there, I have all kinds of stories. Nothing that happens there surprises me, and if it’s AI’s fault here, it would be the least shocking news ever. And if it is, they are going to get destroyed.
I was very impressed with the flooding on the streets of New Dehli when I visited a couple years ago.
An update about the crash is supposed to be released by the end of the week. Speculation is leaning towards deliberate shutting of fuel to the engine during take off. Sadly pilot suicide is occurring way to often. https://www.reuters.com/world/india...ia-crash-indias-aviation-ministry-2025-07-08/
When I talk about corruption, I will guarantee if that’s the verdict on Friday, many in India and elsewhere will question whether simply blaming the crew was the easiest way to protect the airline from charges of maintenance issues. They better have really solid evidence that stands up to independent scrutiny.
If this is the case, the data recorder records every button push and switch. If one of them simply reached down and turned off the engine/fuel, the data recorder will absolutely have that. I’m not technically knowledgeable enough to know how easy that would be to falsify after the fact, but if that’s what happened, they already know. Awful if true.
Is it possible they could have bumped a switch and turned it off by accident? Then not realizing they were the source of the problem, not consider that possibility when troubleshooting?
No. the fuel/engine switch needs to be lifted then switched to prevent just that. Also they are about 4-5 inches apart so even if they did one the other engine would function. It does make sense as to why the RAT was deployed. When power is lost to certain Buses the RAT is deployed and shutting down both engines and not having the APU running would produce the result that exact result. So Fing selfish. You wanna off yourself, go fight a tiger or something
The cockpit voice recorder will be key helping to determine if cutting the fuel was a deliberate sabotage act, or part of some restart sequence. It will be interesting if they release a transcript of it.
"The aircraft achieved the maximum recorded airspeed of 180 Knots IAS at about 08:08:42 UTC and immediately thereafter, the Engine 1 and Engine 2 fuel cutoff switches transitioned from RUN to CUTOFF position one after another with a time gap of 01 sec. The Engine N1 and N2 began to decrease from their take-off values as the fuel supply to the engines was cut off. In the cockpit voice recording, one of the pilots is heard asking the other why did he cutoff. The other pilot responded that he did not do so." https://aaib.gov.in/What's New Assets/Preliminary Report VT-ANB.pdf So sad.
I’ve turned off those engines hundreds and hundreds of times and that’s about how long it takes…..One then the other. So if what you said it accurate that’s suicide/homicide.
What about this nugget from the report. Do you think the switches could have both flipped by accident? The FAA issued Special Airworthiness Information Bulletin (SAIB) No. NM-18-33 on December 17, 2018, regarding the potential disengagement of the fuel control switch locking feature. This SAIB was issued based on reports from operators of Model 737 airplanes that the fuel control switches were installed with the locking feature disengaged. The airworthiness concern was not considered an unsafe condition that would warrant airworthiness directive (AD) by the FAA. The fuel control switch design, including the locking feature, is similar on various Boeing airplane models including part number 4TL837-3D which is fitted in B787-8 aircraft VT-ANB. As per the information from Air India, the suggested inspections were not carried out as the SAIB was advisory and not mandatory. The scrutiny of maintenance records revealed that the throttle control module was replaced on VT-ANB in 2019 and 2023. However, the reason for the replacement was not linked to the fuel control switch. There has been no defect reported pertaining to the fuel control switch since 2023 on VT-ANB."
as they mentioned they are both spring loaded, and they have a small metal gate that you have to lift the switch up and over from the run to cutoff position and vice versa. It’s not like a toggle light switch. If you google 787 fuel switch pictures you can zoom in at the base as see it. And the fact they were done sequentially one then the other a second apart makes me think it was purposeful as that is how we do it every day when we park at the gate and shut them down. Didn’t even occur to me at the onset that this was suicide/homicide. Guess I have to start thinking differently.
Assuming it was a purposeful act…I think almost anyone can understand someone being really unhappy and having thoughts of suicide, even if it’s morally repugnant to them or just plain wrong. It’s the idea of taking hundreds of innocent people with you that will never make sense. How angry or just completely gone mentally do you have to be to ruin countless other lives to serve your own ends?
