Posts about: "AAIB (All)" [Posts: 151 Pages: 8]

There are at least two whatsapp chain messages doing the rounds (one about the seat theory and one about water on electrics causing FADEC failure). Both are very detailed but clearly fake news with incorrect dates, ECAM instead of EICAS and lots of other things which are clearly inaccurate. They\x92ve probably seen this and reporting it as news

Yes, they are electrically adjusted. So a pin is not involved and a sudden move rearward is highly unlikely.

I will wager that this is absolute nonsense. The effect of pulling the power levers back to idle at rotate would be readily countered by pushing them back up again. The engines are still delivering thrust, it is a function of N1, not the lever. The lever commands where the thrust level will end up, the N1 gives the thrust output. The acceleration/thrust characteristics of these engines is not like a J52 or JT3D etc.

The proposition that is floated is that the pilot does not pull back on the control column, which he is holding onto with both hands as his seat slides backwards like a caricature of a bad Cessna 180 seat rail, that is plainly obvious from the pitch attitude of the aircraft, yet grabs lustily a double handful of thrust levers and holds onto those until meeting Ganesh in the next life?

Greek papers appear to be as rigorous and incisive in their cognition as the Daily Telegraph. Golly.

Seats: electric.
RAT deployment... presumably the hapless pilot doesn't grab the control column, or the thrust levers, just grabs both fuel control switches instead????

Do any reporters bother to read what they write?

I saw the comment stating the above on AHerald (giving a detailed timeline of events). But why would the captain keep his hand on thrust levers at Vr? Also, can electrically adjustable seats suddenly just slide backwards? Additionally, this doesn't account for the RAT deployment. If they had truly firewalled the throttles afterward, we would expect to see a pitch-up moment\x97which isn\x92t evident in the video (at least to me). Perhaps a nose-down trim could have counteracted it, but that seems like a bit of a stretch.

The Ipeco seats fitted on the 787 (and other airframes) have had numerous problems and numerous Airworthiness Directives to correct issues of uncommanded movement. They are not exclusively electric (i.e. can also be manually adjusted), and presumably there is some sort of pin or locking mechanism to hold them in place and this mechanism (at least in original form or if not corrected) has been known to fail.

The most famous incidents involving the 787 resulted in uncommanded forward movement of the seat, resulting in inadvertent depressing of the yoke and an unexpected pitch down. Other Ipeco seats have been implicated in unexpected forward AND rearward movements. The FAA published an AD just a couple of days ago related to an Ipeco seat doing just that (different model seat not on Boeing planes, FWIW).


You're probably right. Until we start getting reliable information from official sources it's wise to take the theories of a single news outlet with a huge chunk of salt.

Folks, if an interim report or other official communication from the investigation is released, it will almost certainly come from India's AAIB or at least be posted to its site. So checking there before posting something like that here would be a really good idea.

https://aaib.gov.in/

Admin note: the url is correct, app are the Government allow advertising on their sites!

SPlot

Boeing and the AAIB only arrived at the scene this morning. Black boxes were recovered on Friday.

What you are saying is, as several have said before, is that everything started to fail at or shortly before rotation. Joining the dots from two other branches in this thread is it correct to say that there are only two things that happen at that point: the aircraft transitions from "ground" to "air" (multiple sensors) and there is a change in orientation such that any liquid (eg potable water) that has found its way into the EE bay will move. Question: the aircraft was routed DEL-AMD-LGW. Where was the potable water tankage topped up? Presumably prior to the longest sector? In addition to the inspection list that the Indian AAIB has mandated should they also inspect peer aircraft for EE bay corrosion...?

Therefore I expect the recorder/s will only be read today or tomorrow. So "if there was a major issue they would know by now" is unlikely.

My expectation is that at the very least the AAIB (India) would want to open / read in the presence of the AAIB (UK) and the manufacturer. They might even want to read it at a location with specialist equipment (NTSB in Washington, BEA in France, AAIB in UK). None of this would be unprecedented when looking at previous accident investigations particularly for those that took place in developing countries.

Quick example, EK 521 accident in DXB:

Pakistan A320 accident Karachi:

(1st June was 10 days after the accident).

Folks, if an interim report or other official communication from the investigation is released, it will almost certainly come from India's AAIB or at least be posted to its site. So checking there before posting something like that here would be a really good idea.

https://aaib.gov.in/

Admin note: the url is correct, app are the Government allow advertising on their sites!

SPlot

Boeing and the AAIB only arrived at the scene this morning. Black boxes were recovered on Friday.

"On Jun 17th 2025 an official, a former Air India Captain trained by the Captain of the accident flight, stated, that the CVR has been successfully read out, the voices on the CVR are very clear. It is becoming gradually clear from the newly emerging evidence that there was probably zero negligence in the cockpit, the crew did not give up until the very last moment. The probability of a technical cause is high. A preliminary report by India's AAIB can be expected in a few days."

AvH

Where is this quote from? a link perhaps 👍

"The probability of a technical cause is high."

If this report is accurate, I'd hazard that a specific maintenance issue has been identified. If the "technical cause" was a system or parts failure or fault, then I'd expect a lot of similar 787s to have been grounded by now.

Agreed.
Also, I expect the airport would've sent a car out to check the runway for evidence. Since we agree that the engine failure occurred near rotation, and that rotation occured well inside the runway ( see e.g. fdr here , or the granular ADS-B data), that car would've encountered a bloody mess, and we'd all know about it by now.

The problem with these reports is that the Indian AAIB and DGCA websites ( aaib.gov.in www.dgca.gov.in ) are mute on the subject of this crash, so even the DGCA inspection mandate quoted above is shakily sourced. On Friday, AvHerald had already updated with "On Jun 13th 2025 the DGCA reported, that initial preliminary findings rule out a bird strike as no bird carcasses have been found." I searched for a source for this, and found an "exclusive" which read, "The initial probe report of the Ahmedabad Air India crash, accessed by CNN-News18, reveals key findings from the Directorate General of Civil Aviation\x92s assessment led by the director of security." Other media simply quoted News18. There are two reasons to be skeptical here:
\x95 first, we have seen fake reports circulating;
\x95 secondly, News18 rates badly on mediabiasfactcheck.com: "Launched in 2005, CNN-News18 (formerly CNN-IBN) is an English-language Indian news television channel based in India. We also rate them Questionable based on a poor fact-checking record with numerous false claims."
That leads me to consider that this "exclusive" might be sloppy reporting based on a fake\x97I have no way to know whether it is legitimate or not.

At this point, I feel we can only rely on information being official if it's published through an official website, or if there's independent reporting or a video clip from an official press briefing.

I do believe the accident was not caused by an animal strike, for many reasons.
But I wouldn't believe it based on unsourced reporting alone.

How could the CVR have been "read out" if the CVR hasn't yet been located?

This comment is from a low-budget news source.

well, the first violation of the process. All accredited parties agree to non-disclosure and ONLY the IIC can make public statements.

Having gone through every possible way the aircraft (or those in it) can shut down both engines, thought it would be helpful to look at what investigators have looked at/for in a somewhat similar case. Perhaps it will move the discussion to more unplowed ground.

Going through AAIB Bulletin10/2008 from the British AAIB in the BA 38 case. Before finding the exact cause, they had investigated the following with findings in quotes:

1. General aircraft examination - "no pre‑existing defects with the electrical systems, hydraulics, autoflight systems, navigation systems or the flying controls."
2. Spar valves - "Extensive testing to induce an uncommanded movement, that remained unrecorded, could not identify any such failure modes."
3. High Intensity Radiated Field (HIRF) and Electro- Magnetic Interference(EMI) - "There is therefore no evidence to suggest that HIRF or EMI played any part in this accident."
4. Fuel System - "The examination and testing found no faults in the aircraft fuel system that could have restricted the fuel flow to the engines."
5. Engines - "No pre‑existing defects or evidence of abnormal operation were found with the exception of signs of abnormal cavitation erosion on the delivery side of both HP pumps. Some small debris was recovered from the left FOHE inlet chamber but this would not have restricted the fuel flow."
6. Fuel Loading/Fuel Testing - "No evidence of contamination was found." "The properties of the sampled fuel were also consistent with the parameters recorded in the quality assurance certificate for the bulk fuel loaded onto G‑YMMM at Beijing."
7. Water in Fuel - "It is estimated that the fuel loaded at Beijing would have contained up to 3 ltr (40 parts per million (ppm)) of dissolved water and a maximum of 2 ltr (30 ppm) of undissolved water (entrained or free). These quantities of water are considered normal for aviation turbine fuel."

Knowing the history of this flight, the previous flights and the climate that day, I left out all the discussion in the report of fuel waxing/ice. That seems as irrelevant as 'vapor lock'.

I too am beginning to think this will be, as an earlier poster termed it, a "unicorn" event.

Source: Bulletin_10-2008.pdf

Absolutely. This confidence that the EAFR has already been read is misplaced. It\x92s a specialist piece of equipment and probably can\x92t even be downloaded in India. It\x92s most likely on its way to the NTSB, the BEA or the AAIB (UK) for analysis which will be done under strict conditions (for obvious reasons).