India Begins Inspections of Nation’s 787 Jets After Fatal Crash

(Bloomberg) — India said that 8 of the 34 Boeing Co. 787 planes in the country have been inspected following the fatal crash of an Air India 787 Dreamliner on Thursday that killed all but one of the 242 people on board. 

India’s aviation regulator, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation, is carrying out the checks on the nation’s 787s, Aviation Minister Ram Mohan Naidu said in a press briefing on Saturday in New Delhi. 

Naidu also said that a special multi-department team has been set up to investigate all the non-technical aspects around the crash and has been given three months to report. India’s accident investigation bureau is in charge of probing the technical aspects behind the plane crash.

Investigators have been surveying the wreckage of Air India flight AI171 to determine what caused the aircraft to fail in the deadliest aviation accident in more than a decade.

The DGCA on Friday said it had ordered maintenance checks on all of Air India’s Boeing 787-8 and 787-9 Dreamliners equipped with General Electric Co.’s GEnx engines. The inspections, to be carried out over two weeks, cover fuel, cabin-air, engine-control and hydraulics systems after the Air India plane appeared to lose thrust as it took off. 

Investigative teams from the UK and US arrived Friday in Ahmedabad to assist with the crash probe. 

Thursday’s crash is the first-ever complete loss of a 787, a plane Boeing introduced more than a decade ago with advanced lightweight composite materials that improve fuel efficiency. 

More stories like this are available on bloomberg.com