Air India crash deals blow to carrier’s comeback plans, prolonging its ‘rehabilitation’
The airline must hold open investigation into the accident to regain customer trust amid efforts to overhaul the company to spur growth, analysts say
The London-bound plane, carrying 242 passengers and crew, went down shortly after taking off from the western Indian city of Ahmedabad. News agencies on Friday reported more than 290 people dead, including those on the ground after the aircraft smashed into a medical college hostel at lunch hour.
The tragedy has raised questions about what went wrong for the Boeing Dreamliner, one of the most modern passenger aircraft in service.
Analysts say a detailed study is needed to pinpoint the cause, but the manner in which the plane heading for Gatwick Airport hit a building and exploded into a fireball is bound to cast doubts about the management of operations.
“It looks like [the pilot] had no power available and could not continue his climb. That is a technical issue. It brings up a whole lot of other issues as well about how the airline is being run,” said Mark D Martin, CEO of aviation consultancy Martin Consulting.
It was the first crash for the Dreamliner, which began flying commercially in 2011, according to the Aviation Safety Network database. The ill-fated plane flew for the first time in 2013 and was delivered to Air India a year later, according to flight-tracking website Flightradar24.
One television channel showed the plane taking off over a residential area and then disappearing from the screen before a huge jet of fire could be seen rising into the sky from beyond the houses.