NEW DELHI: A preliminary report depicted confusion in the cockpit shortly before an Air India jetliner crashed and killed 260 people last month, after the plane’s engine fuel cutoff switches flipped almost simultaneously and starved the engines of fuel.
The Boeing 787 Dreamliner bound for London from the Indian city of Ahmedabad began to lose thrust and sink shortly after takeoff, according to the report on the world’s deadliest aviation accident in a decade released on Saturday by Indian accident investigators.
The report by India’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) about the June 12 crash raises fresh questions over the position of the critical engine fuel cutoff switches.
Almost immediately after the plane lifted off the ground, closed-circuit TV footage showed a backup energy source called a ram air turbine had deployed, indicating a loss of power from the engines.
Reveals one pilot questioned the other about fuel cut before the crash as the second denied it
In the flight’s final moments, one pilot was heard on the cockpit voice recorder asking the other why he cut off the fuel.
“The other pilot responded that he did not do so,” the report said.
The fuel switches had almost simultaneously flipped from run to cutoff just after takeoff.
The preliminary report did not say how the switches could have flipped to the cutoff position during the flight.
“We care for the welfare and the well-being of pilots so let’s not jump to any conclusions at this stage, let us wait for the final report,” Civil Aviation Minister Ram Mohan Naidu told local news channels.
Fuel switches
Experts have said a pilot would not be able to accidentally move the fuel switches. “If they were moved because of a pilot, why?” asked US aviation safety expert Anthony Brickhouse.
The switches flipped a second apart, the report said, roughly the time it would take to shift one and then the other, according to US aviation expert John Nance.
He added that a pilot would normally never turn the switches off in flight, especially as the plane is starting to climb.
Flipping to cutoff almost immediately cuts the engines. It is most often used to turn engines off once a plane has arrived at its airport gate and in certain emergency situations, such as an engine fire.
At the crash site, both fuel switches were found in the run position and there had been indications of both engines relighting before the low-altitude crash, said the report, which was released around 2000 GMT on Friday
Asked about the report, the father of first officer Kunder told reporters “I am not from the airline”, declining to comment further during a prayer meeting held in the memory of the airline’s crew on Saturday in Mumbai, where emotional scenes played out among grieving relatives.
Crash probe
The AAIB, an office under India’s civil aviation ministry, is leading the probe into the crash, which killed all but one of the 242 people on board and 19 others on the ground.
Most air crashes are caused by multiple factors, with a preliminary report due 30 days after the accident, according to international rules, and a final report expected within a year.
The plane’s black boxes, combined cockpit voice recorders and flight data recorders, were recovered in the days following the crash and later downloaded in India.
The report said “all applicable airworthiness directives and alert service bulletins were complied (with) on the aircraft as well as engines”.
Published in Dawn, July 13th, 2025