A crash probe, a flight of fancy – World

A crash probe, a flight of fancy – World

A crash probe, a flight of fancy – World

THERE was always the lingering fear that investigations into the Air India crash of June 12, as often happens with aviation accidents, would be subverted by powerful vested interests. The fear may have come true with curious comments circulating about the interim report released on Saturday.

Making the probe murkier are busybodies led by a person described in the media as a “former Boeing aircraft trainer and an aviation safety consultant”.

In a TV interview about the early findings of the probe, Captain Mohan Ranganathan levelled an astounding charge against the senior pilot of the ill-fated plane, First Officer Captain Sumit Sabharwal. Ranganathan claimed, on the basis of hearsay, that Sabharwal was suffering from depression, and that he had likely cut off the fuel supply to the engines in a suicidal moment. News reports have carried the claim without challenging it. Even if there’s a grain of truth in the claim, which seems highly unlikely, it has implications for the global aviation industry, particularly about pilots’ mental health and the role of airlines in ensuring there isn’t another lapse.

The interim report, based on the reading of the black boxes, signalled the likelihood that the fuel supply to both engines of the Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner was cut off seconds after take-off. It didn’t point the finger at anyone but also didn’t ask how such a devastating thing could have happened. Western pilots have chipped in about the fuel switches but stopped short of blaming the men in the cockpit. Discussion has centred around two knobs on the cockpit panel that can be turned on or off manually, but which require conscious effort involving two or three stages of manoeuvre.

An easy impression is being promoted nevertheless that the switches are something like a kitchen tap that mechanically controls the flow of water with a valve. But unlike the water pipes in the house, aeroplane fuel pipes don’t run through the cockpit. The switches send a signal like the button on the remote control, which when pressed triggers a series of messaging, from electronic to radio to electronic to electrical to turn off the TV. What makes Ranganathan and other accusers of the pilots ignore the possibility of an electronic failure happening away from the cockpit, somewhere in the belly or the wings of the plane, which perhaps interdicted the fuel supply? Not doing due diligence to the possibility of an electronic failure is not merely an oversight, but grave injustice to the bereaved, and a hazard for air travel.

Turning an incomplete probe into a forum of speculative opinions inevitably serves the interests of those who don’t want a fair investigation.

India’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) released the preliminary report on the weekend and noted that the fuel supply to both engines was cut off within a second of each other, causing confusion in the cockpit and prompting the aeroplane to plummet back to the ground almost immediately after taking off.

According to the 15-page report one of the two pilots who is unidentified asked the other why he had cut off the fuel, which the other denied. The pilots were thus aware of the grave problem, which explains the mayday signal they sent out. Why should anyone rule out the possibility that in their split-second bid to resolve the fatal glitch, they may have moved the fuel switch up or down to make it work, if at all they did that.

Ranganathan won’t give up though. He has claimed learning from unnamed sources that the senior pilot on the Ahmedabad-London flight, Captain Sabharwal, with 8,260 hours of flying, had been upset for some time over alleged separation from his wife. Going by this line of argument every pilot in the future should be probed about marital discord. But it doesn’t end there. Ranganathan, leaning on rumours, again, claims that the pilot was not only depressed but was also taking medication for the illness, and was often on medical leave. Ranganathan goes on to reveal a wider scandal, saying that it was not unusual for pilots to produce doctored health certificates. By that token how can pilots, or the system that allows falsification of information, ever be trusted?

Turning a yet incomplete probe into a forum of speculative opinions, a veritable Rashomon-like theatre, if you like, of theories and whispered rumours, inevitably serves the interests of those who don’t want a fair probe, particularly if the line of inquiry adversely impacts their billion-dollar businesses.

Boeing was in neck-deep trouble until last month over two fatal accidents apparently caused by malfunctioning electronic equipment. On May 30, however, the US Department of Justice dropped its criminal case against the company over the two crashes of 737 Max jets.

Boeing agreed last year to plead guilty to defrauding regulators after the crashes of the 737 Max jets, in 2018 and 2019, that killed 346 people. But a federal judge rejected that proposed plea deal. Now, according to America’s National Public Radio, the Justice Department has weighed in on another agreement that would allow Boeing to avoid criminal prosecution. The company would agree instead to a non-criminal settlement that would include $444.5 million for a crash victims’ fund.

As soon as the AAIB interim report was out, America’s aviation safety regulator issued the proverbial clean chit to Boeing, saying the report has “found no urgent safety concerns” related either to the engines or aeroplane systems of the Boeing 787-8.

The Indian Commercial Pilots’ Association has asserted that the crew of flight AI-171 acted in line with their training and responsibilities under challenging conditions. However, when the stakes are high, it is often a political call that sets the tone for the way a probe is conducted. In India’s case, there is the unflattering precedent of the American chief of Union Carbide being arrested in Bhopal for the 1984 gas tragedy before being allowed, with political intervention, to show a clean pair of heels. That was then. This is now.

The writer is Dawn’s correspondent in Delhi.

jawednaqvi@gmail.com

Published in Dawn, July 15th, 2025

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