Crash and burn: On the Air India Ahmedabad plane crash and Indian aviation.
India’s aviation sector needs to address safety concerns.
The first hull loss of the ‘Dreamliner’, one of aviation’s most advanced twin-aisle aircraft, is one that is unsettling, more so when there have been recent examples of survivability in modern widebody jets. The tragic end to Air India flight AI171, on June 12, 2025 — there was one surviving passenger — just minutes after its liftoff from Ahmedabad for London Gatwick, and it touched a recorded barometric altitude of 625 feet, will be under much global scrutiny. That the crew were faced with a sudden and sharp turn of events on the 11-plus-year-old Boeing 787-8, a plane with ample avionics redundancy, and reliable twin engines — the GEnx-1B67, rated at 67,000 lbs of thrust each — has led to much speculation about the cause. Experts have suggested reasons such as issues with load planning, ambient air temperature and engine performance, wing surface settings, and even a bird hit. Inducted by Air India during its government-owned days, as part of a 68-aircraft deal signed with Boeing in 2006, the subfleet of 787-8s has played a role in its medium to long-haul network expansion to Europe, the Far East and Australia. The plane’s global safety record has been strong in general, but it has also been an aircraft type that has raised some concerns. These have included assembly-line quality control, ‘whistle-blower’ statements, engine icing problems that resulted in a safety directive, a lithium aerospace battery-related electrical system issue that led to extensive world-wide groundings, an emergency locator transmitter battery fire that caused heat damage, and, in 2024, an in-flight upset that was linked to a feature in the flight deck crew seat.
All eyes will be on how the airline’s new owner, Tata Sons (with a 25.1% shareholding by Singapore Airlines Limited), steers its operations and addresses safety concerns after an ‘unprecedented’ four-airline merger. The group is in the middle of executing Vihaan.AI, the airline’s ‘transformational roadmap over five years’, with the appointment of a ‘head of group safety, security and quality’ integral to this. In parallel, the airline has also faced scrutiny by India’s civil aviation regulatory body, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation. With a formal investigation, that includes international participation, having been initiated, in keeping with aviation protocols, the complexities that a first-time 787 crash analysis could throw up should be ironed out. At the 81st International Air Transport Association annual general meeting and World Air Transport Summit in New Delhi last week, India was recognised to be one of the largest aviation markets. However, its rapidly expanding aviation sector needs to address the challenges, which include safety, on the ground and in the air.