The Air India flight AI171 from Ahmedabad to London’s Gatwick airport that crashed minutes after takeoff on Thursday in a residential area near the Gujarat city’s airport with 242 people onboard was a Dreamliner from Boeing, the aircraft company that has been mired in controversy in recent years.
Sam Salehpour, a Boeing engineer-turned whistleblower, had reportedly told the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in January last year that Boeing took shortcuts when manufacturing its 787 Dreamliner jets, and that the risks could become catastrophic as the planes age.
The cause of the Ahmedabad crash, one of the worst civil aviation accidents in India, is not yet known. Neither is the death toll clear at the time of publishing this report.
The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) in a statement said the aircraft piloted by captain Sumeet Sabharwal with 8,200 hours of experience and first officer Clive Kundar with 1,100 hours of experience made a Mayday call minutes after takeoff.
"We are aware of initial reports and are working to gather more information," Boeing said in a statement.
Salehpour, who worked in Boeing for 10 years, had reportedly claimed that “787 Dreamliner planes have structural failings that could eventually cause them to break apart”.
The whistleblower also said that a change to the construction process had introduced shortcuts that caused parts of the plane's fuselage to be improperly fastened together. These parts could, he warned, fall apart after thousands of flights.
Earlier, in 2019, The New York Times spoke to other Boeing whistleblowers at the plant in Charleston, South Carolina where the 787 is made. They alleged that workers were pressured to work quickly on the planes and that concerns were ignored.
Boeing had denied the allegations.
“These claims about the structural integrity of the 787 are inaccurate and do not represent the comprehensive work Boeing has done to ensure the quality and long-term safety of the aircraft,” the aircraft manufacturing giant had said in a statement.
The FAA had reportedly investigated whether Boeing completed the inspections and whether company employees may have falsified aircraft records.
Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner planes that entered service in 2011 could have 50-year lifespans – around 44,000 flights each, the company has said.
Air India had in January 2006 ordered 68 Boeing aircraft, including 27 B787-800s (Dreamliner series). The first set of jets arrived in 2012.
The 787-8 has a seating capacity of 256 passengers, with 18 in business class (2-2-2 configuration) and 238 in economy (3-3-3 layout). As of April this year, Air India was looking to replace the 787-8 Dreamliners that are more than 10 years old.
The national carrier’s entire Europe operations are run on Boeing 787 Dreamliners. The 787 flies to important cities such as London and Paris.
In April, Air India was in talks with Boeing to acquire aircraft intended for Chinese carriers but left undelivered due to ongoing trade tensions between Washington and Beijing, per a Bloomberg report.
The potential acquisition was a part of the Tata Group-owned airline’s broader strategy to overhaul its fleet and expand rapidly, to keep pace with competitors.
On Wednesday, US President Donald Trump's nominee to head the FAA vowed to hold Boeing accountable after a series of safety issues raised questions about the planemaker.
Acting FAA administrator Chris Rocheleau said he was not considering lifting a production cap of 38 planes per month on Boeing's 737 Max. The cap was imposed after a January 2024 mid-air emergency involving a new Alaska Airlines Boeing plane that was found to be missing four key bolts, Reuters reported.
Boeing is still reeling following the crashes of two 737 Max aircraft which killed a total of 346 people in 2018 and 2019.
In May, the US justice department reached a deal with Boeing that allowed the company to avoid criminal prosecution for allegedly misleading American regulators about the 737 Max jetliner, and the company will pay and invest more than $ 1.1 billion.
Boeing, which is listed at the New York Stock Exchange, saw its share slide by 8 per cent in pre-market trades immediately after Thursday’s crash and was at $214 per share around 3.40pm India time.