Air India cancelled five international flights — all using the 787-8 Dreamliner — Tuesday amid increased scrutiny of Boeing’s flagship aircraft after the horrific crash last week in Ahmedabad, reports NDTV.
The cancelled services are AI 915 (Delhi-Dubai), AI 153 (Delhi-Vienna), AI 143 (Delhi-Paris), AI 159 (Ahmedabad-London), and AI 170 (London-Amritsar). In addition to these, a technical issue also affected a Dreamliner operating as AI 315 to Delhi, forcing the pilot to return to Hong Kong.
And, earlier Tuesday, an Air India San Francisco-Mumbai flight suffered a technical snag during a scheduled halt at Kolkata, prompting the airline to de-board all passengers.
Also, two Dreamliners operated by Lufthansa and British Airways — flying from Frankfurt and London to Hyderabad and Chennai — were forced to return to their origin airports.
Air India said its AI 143 service ran into an issue during pre-flight checks, and that the time taken to fix it means the flight will run afoul of restrictions on night-time operations at Paris’ Charles de Gaulle airport.
On cancelling the day’s Ahmedabad-London Gatwick service, the airline blamed an unavailability of aircraft due to airspace restrictions and additional precautionary checks.
There was no technical snag in the Dreamliner scheduled to fly the route, the airline said.
Overall, the number of cancellations and mid-air switchbacks related to the Dreamliner has raised eyebrows, coming as they do after the tragedy on June 12, when Air India’s AI 171, a service from Ahmedabad to London Gatwick, crashed less than 40 seconds after it took off.
Terrifying videos showed the plane struggling to gain altitude before it fell into a college hostel less than 2km from the airport and exploding into a terrifying fireball.
241 of 242 people on board were killed, the survivor was a British-Indian man in seat 11A. At least 33 deaths were reported from the ground, making it one of India’s worst aviation disasters.
The voice and flight data recorders from AI 171 have been recovered and are being analysed, but experts believe it could be months before the crash can be satisfactorily explained.
Preliminary analysis of the video of the crash indicates the RAT, or Ram Air Turbine, had deployed.
This only happens when there is dual engine or a system-wide electronic or hydraulic failure, experts have told NDTV. However, what caused this failure is still an unknown.
Meanwhile, according to Reuters, Air India operates 33 Boeing 787s.
Rival IndiGo has one, for now, according to flight tracking website Flightradar24.
Reuters said the Directorate General of Civil Aviation has ordered exhaustive maintenance checks on 787-8/9 variants equipped with GEnx engines, including assessments of certain take-off parameters, electronic engine control tests and engine fuel-related checks.
