787 Crashes in India

Sparkchaser

787 crashes in India, All 242 on board Ahmedabad-London flight are dead, confirms police
https://www.financialexpress.com/india-news/ahmedabad-air-india-plane-crash-live-updates-london-bound-flight-death-toll-injured/3877181/

AMDUSER

Sparkchaser

Oh my gosh…

telcodad

Lack Of Lift, Pilots Yanking Yoke: What May Have Happened In Plane’s Cockpit
Air India flight 171 from Ahmedabad to the Gatwick airport in London crashed around 1.30 pm on Thursday, shortly after taking off.
NDTV News - June 12, 2025
https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/air-india-crash-ahmedabad-ai-171-lack-of-lift-pilots-yanking-yoke-what-may-have-happened-in-planes-cockpit-8649930

There is conjecture that bird ingestion into both engines could have been the cause:

India-UK plane crash: Investigators will want to know if incident was catastrophic one-off or part of wider problem with Dreamliner
The Boeing 787 Dreamliner has a stellar safety record. This is the first fatal crash. So what could have gone wrong?
By Thomas Moore, Science correspondent @SkyNews - June 12, 2025
https://news.sky.com/story/india-uk-plane-crash-investigators-will-want-to-know-if-incident-was-catastrophic-one-off-or-part-of-wider-problem-with-dreamliner-13382641

Contact was lost with AI171 just seconds after it took off, when it was at an altitude of just 190m (623ft). The two engines should have been working at maximum thrust to gain the speed needed to lift 242 people and a plane-load of fuel off the ground. But video shows the aircraft failed to climb. Its nose should have been pointed upwards, and the plane accelerating. But it was flying level and then it descends, lifting its nose almost as if it was coming in to land.

It’s possible there was an engine failure of some kind, perhaps caused by a catastrophic mechanical fault. But the plane is designed to be able to fly with one engine, even at take-off, so something else would have to go wrong too.

Both engines could have failed if they sucked in a flock of birds as the plane took off. It’s happened in other air crashes. …

Dks01

Boeing stock takes a hit on first Dreamliner staff.

Zer0Cool

holy fek…

telcodad

Live updates on CNN’s site:

CNN - Live updates: Plane crashes in western Indian city of Ahmedabad
https://www.cnn.com/world/live-news/ahmedabad-india-plane-crash-06-12-25

And on The Times of India site:

THE TIMES OF INDIA - Air India Ahmedabad Plane Crash Live Updates
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/ahmedabad/ahmedabad-air-india-plane-crash-news-live-air-india-london-flight-crash-sardar-vallabhbhai-patel-international-airport-deaths-injured-rescue-operation-latest-updates/liveblog/121799226.cms

MacLeech

At least 1 man from flight survived:
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ce3v6drp96zo

Ahmedabad Police Commissioner GS Malik told ANI there was one survivor who was in seat 11A on the London-bound Boeing 787-8 flight.

The flight manifest shared by authorities said the passenger in that seat was British national Vishwash Kumar Ramesh.

Indian media said they had spoken to Mr Ramesh in hospital and reported him saying: “Thirty seconds after take-off, there was a loud noise and then the plane crashed. It all happened so quickly.”

The article also contains a video of the flight seconds before the crash. It seems quieter than it should be, with little engine noise as the plane flys sounding to me like a single prop driven plane, especially if the engines are supposed to be full throttle for take-off.

telcodad

MacLeech At least 1 man from flight survived:

He was quoted by Indian media as saying: “Thirty seconds after take-off, there was a loud noise and then the plane crashed. It all happened so quickly.”

MacLeech

Live updates on BBC show various debris from plane and buildings the plane crashed into:
https://www.bbc.com/news/live/c8d1r3m8z92t

The plane crashed into accommodation used by doctors - one woman describes how her son survived by jumping from the second floor window

At least 50 medical students are in hospital after the plane crashed into a doctors’ hostel, officials have said

Tata Group, which owns Air India, has said it would give one crore rupees - the equivalent of around £86,000 - to the families of each person who was killed in the crash

telcodad

MacLeech The article also contains a video of the flight seconds before the crash. It seems quieter than it should be, with little engine noise as the plane flys sounding to me like a single prop driven plane, especially if the engines are supposed to be full throttle for take-off.

From: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/121806996.cms

According to Air Traffic Control (ATC), the aircraft sent out a Mayday call moments after departure but then fell silent.

real_aurgathor

telcodad

Kinda hard to quantify the sound from distant recordings, but it sure looks like the plane simply lost power.

Whether that’s due to birds or something else, that is not possible to say with certainty without additional information,

https://www.bbc.com/news/videos/cy4kxq9e9gqo

telcodad

real_aurgathor Whether that’s due to birds or something else, that is not possible to say with certainty without additional information,

Yeah, but a multiple bird strike scenario looks like a leading contender:

From: https://www.newsweek.com/air-india-flight-171-crash-veteran-pilots-what-could-have-gone-wrong-2084706

Bird Strike and Double Engine Failure

The theory that a bird strike caused a dual engine failure has also gained traction. The aircraft crashed shortly after liftoff, a critical portion of flight when bird activity near airports can pose serious risks. “Bird strikes can be very challenging,” Bubb said. “Especially if an engine ingests birds and fails, as happened in the [2009] US Airways Hudson River landing.”

Dr. Jason Knight, a lecturer at the University of Portsmouth, told Sky that the most likely cause of a double engine failure at low altitude would be a bird strike. “Because the altitude was so low, the pilot would have had very little time to do an emergency landing,” he said. Saurabh Bhatnagar, another former pilot speaking to NDTV in India, said the aircraft appeared to lose power “short of taking the gear up,” which can happen “only in case the engine loses power or the aircraft stops developing lift.”

Ahmedabad airport is known for its bird strike hazard. According to The Telegraph, it had the second-highest number of reported bird strikes in India in 2023, despite operating significantly fewer flights than major hubs like Indira Gandhi International Airport in Delhi.

telcodad

But again, there are a lot of other possibilities:

What Caused the Air India Crash? Experts Study Video of the Plane’s Descent.
Safety experts said investigators would be looking at why and how the plane started descending during its take off.
By Niraj Chokshi and Christine Chung, The NY Times - June 12, 2025
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/12/business/india-plane-crash-causes.html

… Mr. Cox and other experts cautioned against jumping to conclusions. Planes and the aviation system have many redundancies to prevent a single problem from leading to a calamity. As a result, crashes are typically caused by multiple failures, which can include equipment malfunctions, improper maintenance, bird strikes or pilot error. Early hypotheses often are ruled out during lengthy, technical crash investigations.

Officials looking into the crash will have no shortage of questions to ask, said Greg Feith, a former investigator at the National Transportation Safety Board. “Did they properly configure the airplane when it took off? What was occurring with them? Was there a loss of thrust?” he asked. “Was there fuel contamination? Fuel starvation where both engines weren’t getting fuel that would have caused a loss of thrust on both engines?” ….

Heat84

A pilot on Fox News said the flaps were in the wrong position.

HELLFIRE

Well S**T!
“We’ll See…”

We’re how many months past the Jeju incident and we’re nowhere close to a definitive answer what happened?

shrugs

Regards

telcodad

Heat84 A pilot on Fox News said the flaps were in the wrong position.

That’s not totally clear given the poor clarity of the video:

Ex-pilot Mr Chan told BBC Verify that the footage that has emerged so far is too distorted to establish for sure whether the flaps were extended, but said that such an error would be “highly unusual”.

But a take-off roll with retracted flaps would trigger warnings from the 787’s take-off Configuration Warning System, alerting the flight crew to an unsafe configuration, according to one pilot the BBC spoke to.

From: https://www.bbc.com/news/live/c8d1r3m8z92t

Plane flaps: Three experts who spoke to BBC Verify suggested that the disaster may have occurred as the aircraft’s flaps were not extended during take-off - though other pilots and analysts have challenged this.

What could have caused Air India plane to crash in 30 seconds?
By Soutik Biswas, India correspondent, BBC and Matt Murphy & Joshua Cheetham, BBC - June 12, 2025
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c626y121rxxo

broknsymetry

Heat84 A pilot on Fox News said the flaps were in the wrong position.

Same on CNN - the flaps were “not the proper takeoff configuration.” Also no birds or engine flameouts.

https://www.cnn.com/2025/06/12/world/video/air-india-plane-crash-expert-analysis-digvid

real_aurgathor

broknsymetry Also no birds or engine flameouts.

And bird strike would probably need to double, which is much less likely. I can’t read the flaps, but an egregious pilot error is definitely a possibility.

Somewhat-Reticent

“But we neeeeed to blame Pilot Error …”?

real_aurgathor

Listing something as a *possibility* is not blame.

There are probably not very many distinct and basic possibilities I can think of that could lead to a crash:

human (usually, but not always pilot) error, or rarely, a malicious act
airplane failure that can be mechanical, electrical, or software
act of God such as a bird strike or bad weather
bullet/missile strike
on-board bomb

Some info about the frequency of some causes:

Some possibilities of types can be easily eliminated just by looking at the videos.