Category: 2. World

India’s aviation regulator has ordered the country’s airlines to examine fuel switches on Boeing aircraft, after a preliminary report on the Air India flight 171 crash in June showed the fuel supply had been cut seconds after takeoff.

The Directorate General of Civil Aviation said it had issued the order after several domestic and international airlines began making their own inspections of the locking mechanisms attached to the switches.

South Korea was also preparing to order all airlines in the country that operate Boeing jets to examine the switches.

A preliminary report, released on Saturday, found both engines of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner, which crashed, killing 260 people, had been starved of fuel, leading investigators to focus on the fuel switches in the cockpit.

There has been online speculation about two competing theories – one of pilot error or sabotage, and one of faulty fuel switch locks – although Air India has cautioned that the investigation is in its early stages and there have been no recommended actions against Boeing.

Air India’s chief executive, Campbell Wilson, said in a memo to staff on Monday that the report had “triggered a new round of speculation in the media” after providing “both greater clarity and opened additional questions”.

Wilson added: “The preliminary report identified no cause nor made any recommendations, so I urge everyone to avoid drawing premature conclusions as the investigation is far from over.”

The report, by India’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB), cited a voice recording from the flight deck in which it said one of the pilots was heard asking the other “why did he cutoff?” The other pilot responded that he “did not do so”, according to the report.

Both switches were moved back to allow fuel to flow, but the plane was too low and slow to recover.

While the report is not intended to provide definitive answers but only lay out basic facts, it has led to theories suggesting one of the pilots had either turned off the fuel to both engines, either by mistake or to deliberately bring down the plane.

Graphic showing a cockpit with engine fuel switches.

The Indian Commercial Pilots’ Association (ICPA) said it was “deeply disturbed by speculative narratives … particularly the reckless and unfounded insinuation of pilot suicide”.

“There is absolutely no basis for such a claim at this stage,” it said in a statement on Sunday, adding: “It is deeply insensitive to the individuals and families involved.”

A separate theory is that the fuel switches, which are located just below the thrust levers, could have switched off by themselves. This is usually not possible as they operate independently and need to be lifted up to disengage a lock.

Adding to concern around fuel switches, the preliminary accident report had cited a bulletin issued by the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in 2018 that had recommended the locking mechanisms be checked on multiple variants of Boeing aircraft, including the 787, after the company had received reports that on some 737 models “fuel control switches were installed with the locking feature disengaged”.

However, the advisory only made recommendations and did not consider it to be “an unsafe condition” that needed a mandated inspection. It was also issued in 2018 and related to so many different types of Boeing jets that it would probably have already been flagged if the locks were not working on operating fleets.

Steve Giordano, a former airline captain who flies several Boeing planes including the 787, said he did not believe the issues were “mechanical” or “airplane related”.

“I’m not convinced it was suicide or intentional,” he wrote on X. “I’m just convinced that the switches were moved by a human hand.”

Jerusalem
CNN
 — 

A planned “humanitarian city” inside Gaza intended to hold hundreds of thousands of Palestinians would be a “concentration camp,” former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has warned.

Defense Minister Israel Katz said last week he had told the military to advance plans for the zone, which would eventually contain the entire population of Gaza. The area would be built on the ruins of the city of Rafah in southern Gaza, and once Palestinians enter the zone, they would not be allowed to leave. Katz also vowed to implement a plan for the emigration of Palestinians from Gaza.

“It is a concentration camp. I am sorry,” Olmert told The Guardian newspaper on Sunday. “If they (Palestinians) will be deported into the new ‘humanitarian city’, then you can say that this is part of an ethnic cleansing.”

In response to Olmert’s comments, the Prime Minister’s Office called him a “convicted felon disgracing Israel on CNN.” In a statement, the office said: “We evacuate civilians. Hamas blocks them. He calls that a war crime?” Olmert was freed from prison in 2017 after serving 16 months on corruption charges.

Olmert has previously blasted the conduct of the Israeli military in Gaza and the country’s political leadership. In May, he said he could no longer defend Israel against accusations of war crimes. “What is it if not a war crime?” he asked rhetorically in an interview with CNN. He said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and far-right members of his government are “committing actions which can’t be interpreted any other way.”

More than 58,000 people have been killed in Gaza since the start of the war, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.

The latest comments from Olmert, who served as Israel’s prime minister from 2006-2009, go much further in criticizing the country’s intentions in Gaza, however, especially since comparisons to Nazi concentration camps in Israel is considered virtually unthinkable. But Olmert said it was the “inevitable interpretation” of the plans.

“When they build a camp where they (plan to) ‘clean’ more than half of Gaza, then the inevitable understanding of the strategy of this (is that) it is not to save (Palestinians). It is to deport them, to push them and to throw them away,” Olmert told the Guardian.

Katz’s plans for what he dubbed the “humanitarian city” were discussed at a meeting with Netanyahu on Sunday evening, according to a source familiar with the matter. But after Israeli news outlets reported that it would take months to build the zone and billions of dollars, the source said Netanyahu asked to make its establishment shorter and less expensive.

Yair Lapid, the head of Israel’s opposition, blasted the plans as an attempt by Netanyahu to let his far-right government partners “run wild with extreme fantasies just to preserve his coalition.” In a statement on social media, Lapid called to “end the war and bring back the hostages.”

Michael Sfard, an Israeli human rights lawyer, told CNN last week that Katz’s plan amounts to the forcible transfer of a population in preparation for deportation. Both of these are war crimes, Sfard said.

“If they are done on a massive scale – whole communities – they can amount to crimes against humanity,” Sfard added, dismissing the notion that any departure from Gaza could be considered voluntary.

What do we know about the airline?published at 16:02 British Summer Time

16:02 BST

Sofia Bettiza
BBC News, reporting from The Netherlands

We are at the headquarters
of Zeusch Aviation, external – the Dutch company operating the plane that crashed at Southend Airport.

The aircraft was returning here to Lelystad
Airport when it went down yesterday. This is a small airport in the Netherlands, on an island to the east of Amsterdam – and today, it’s almost deserted.

We were able to speak to a pilot from another
airline. He told us he’s worried that one of his colleagues may be among the
victims, as many of the staff here know one another.

We tried to speak to someone from Zeusch Aviation,
but their offices are closed, and they are not responding to journalists.

We just saw airport security staff lowering the Dutch flag to half mast at the entrance of the airport.

So what do we know about the
airline?

It’s a privately owned, small
company – they operate 14 aircraft. Zeusch specialises in medical evacuation
flights, private charters, and aerial filming for various events.

On a typical air ambulance flight, there are
usually four people on board: a pilot, a co-pilot, and two medical staff.

The airline has issued a statement saying they are
actively supporting the investigation – and that their thoughts are with
“everyone who has been affected”.

But key questions remain
unanswered – most importantly: who was on board that flight, and what caused
it to crash?

A preliminary investigation report into the Air India crash on June 12 has revealed what happened on the Boeing Dreamliner during its final moments — a 32-second journey from lift-off to its crash into hospital buildings near the airport.

The crash near Ahmedabad airport killed 241 people on board and 19 on ground. Just one passenger survived.

The report focused on the moments after the takeoff, showing the aircraft’s two fuel control switches moved to the ‘cutoff’ position in quick succession. This action cut off fuel supply to the engines, immediately causing the aircraft to lose all thrust.

The switches are on the centre console of the cockpit, just below the engine thrust levers. They are used to control fuel flow to the engines—primarily during engine start-up and shutdown on the ground, or to shut down an engine in the event of an engine failure during flight.

The fuel control switches are equipped with a spring-loaded locking mechanism that keeps them in position and prevents unintended movement. You would have to pull the switch up before moving it from run to cutoff, or vice versa.

Aviation experts say a pilot would not have been able to move the fuel switches accidentally. Once moved, the effect would be immediate, cutting off engine power.

The preliminary report highlighted key events before and after the aircraft took off. All systems were reported to be functioning normally up until the moment the aircraft became airborne.

A series of critical events unfolded in the 32 seconds after the aircraft became airborne, lost thrust and started going down — from the fuel control switches transitioning to the ‘cutoff’ position to the activation of emergency power supply units and the attempted relighting of the engines.

Both fuel switches were found in the run position at the crash site.

India’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau is leading the investigation into the crash. A final report is expected within a year.

What sort of plane was involved in the crash?published at 13:45 British Summer Time

13:45 BST

Tom Symonds
BBC transport correspondent

Image source, AIRTEAMIMAGES

The Beech B200 Super King Air that crashed at Southend Airport is a bit like a Land Rover of the skies.

It’s like an all-purpose vehicle and we can see that it has been rented out for roles including medical evacuation, moving transplant material, aerial mapping, that sort of thing.

The profile of this crash, with witnesses describing the plane veering to the left, suggests loss of power in the left engine.

The records of this type of aircraft show similar crashes over the last 10 years or so.

In one in particular, in Australia, there was a warning after that crash that the throttle levers – that control the power to the two engines – could slip back, reducing the power.

One former aviation accident investigator that I’ve spoken to said that is an area that might be investigated – but these planes can fly with one engine.

Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK) Chief Minister Omar Abdullah scaled the boundary wall of the Mazar-e-Shuhada in Srinagar to pay homage to the martyrs of July 13, 1931, after being denied formal access to the cemetery.

On July 13, 1931, around 22 Kashmiris were martyred by the troops of Dogra Maharaja for appearing outside the Central Jail in Srinagar in support of Abdul Qadeer, who was charged with instigating people to defy the Dogra Rule.

The Indian forces sealed the graveyard and imposed restrictions on the movement of political leaders, blocking Kashmiri leaders from visiting the site on the anniversary of a 1931 uprising.

Taking to X, Abdullah wrote: “Paid my respects & offered Fatiha at the graves of the martyrs of 13th July 1931. The unelected government tried to block my way, forcing me to walk from Nawhatta Chowk. They blocked the gate to Naqshband Sb shrine forcing me to scale a wall. They tried to physically grapple me.”

Speaking to the media later, he said that a security bunker was placed outside his residence to prevent his visit. “Today I did not inform anyone. I quietly drove here myself,” he added.

Visuals from the scene also showed senior NC leader Sakina Itoo arriving at the site on a scooty.

Clues to Trump strategy may come in the weapons Ukraine receivespublished at 11:48 British Summer Time

11:48 BST

Paul Adams
Diplomatic correspondent

There’s every indication that Donald Trump has reached an inflection point in his curious relationship with Vladimir Putin.

It’s clear that he’s increasingly disappointed that a man he prefers to regard as a friend has let him down.

After the shudder of horror in Kyiv that greeted the Pentagon’s decision two weeks ago to suspend weapons deliveries, Ukraine is now cautiously optimistic that the US – its most important ally – is once again on its side.

That’s certainly what Ukraine’s most prominent supporters in Congress are hoping.

“The game, regarding Putin’s invasion of Russia, is about to change,” South Carolina senator Lindsey Graham told CBS News on Sunday.

“I expect, in the coming days, you will see weapons flowing at a record level to help Ukraine defend themselves.”

But what is Donald Trump’s game plan? Is this a negotiating ploy designed to force Vladimir Putin back to the negotiating table, or a return to Joe Biden’s mantra that the US will do “whatever it takes” to support Ukraine “for as long as it takes.”

Some clues may come in the sort of weaponry the White House is now proposing to send to Ukraine.

Patriot air defence systems are vital to protect Ukraine from Russia’s frequent bombardments, but are, as the name suggests, purely defensive in nature.