Air India plane crash: Analysis of cockpit voice recorder reveals captain 'deliberately cut off fuel' with younger copilot 'asking why'
An initial analysis of the cockpit voice recorder recovered from the Air India flight that crashed last month has been revealed.
In it the younger co-pilot asked the captain why he had turned off the plane’s fuel-supply switches, according to a US media report. First officer Clive Kunder had the controls of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner for take-off and at the time of the crash moments later outside Ahmedabad airport, according to a new report from the Wall Street Journal citing sources in the investigation.
It was he who asked flight captain Sumeet Sabharwal why he had flipped the switches, starving the engines of fuel. This emerges several days after a preliminary official report in the crash revealed only that the brief interaction had taken place, without naming who said what or quoting them directly.
Air India Flight 171 crashed into a medical college less than a minute after take-off from Ahmedabad in western India heading for London Gatwick, killing 241 people on board and another 19 on the ground. Only one passenger survived the crash. The preliminary report, issued a month after the crash in line with international regulations, has sparked controversy with a pilots’ association accusing it of trying to place the blame on Sabharwal and Kunder without conclusive evidence.
The Federation of Indian Pilots (FIP) on Thursday said the 15-page report released lacks comprehensive data and appears to rely selectively on paraphrased cockpit voice recordings to suggest pilot error and question the professional competence and integrity of the flight crew. It said: “Assigning blame before a thorough, transparent and data-driven investigation is both premature and irresponsible. Such speculative commentary undermines the professionalism of highly trained crew members causes undue distress to their families and colleagues”.
The Journal did not say if there was any evidence that Sabharwal did move the switches, beyond the verbal exchange it cited. But it quoted US pilots who have read the Indian authorities’ report as saying that Kunder, the pilot actively flying, likely would have had his hands full pulling back on the Dreamliner’s controls at that stage of the flight.
On Sunday, The Telegraph revealed that Air India crash investigators are examining the medical records of Mr Sabharwal amid claims that he suffered from depression and mental health problems. Captain Sabharwal, 56, had been considering leaving the airline to look after his elderly father following the death of his mother in 2022.
In the moments before the disaster, Mr Sabharwal issued a mayday call. However, after the aircraft reached a maximum altitude of barely 400ft above the runway all contact was lost. Campbell Wison, the Air India chief executive, said in a staff memo that the report had “triggered a new round of speculation in the media”.
Mr Wilson said the report identified no cause nor made any recommendations and urged people to avoid drawing premature conclusions as investigation was far from over. Indian media, however, reported that investigators were examining potential electrical and digital faults that could have triggered “uncommanded” actions.