Aviation accident experts probing the devastating Air India flight 171 crash are investigating whether sabotage played a part in the doomed aircraft’s fate.
There were 53 Britons onboard the Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner that exploded shortly after taking off from the western Indian city of Ahmedabad on June 12.
All 242 passengers but one were killed – the sole survivor being Vishwash Kumar Ramesh, 40, a British father who lost his brother in the tragic incident.
The aircraft spent less than 40 seconds in the air before exploding upon impact and numerous explanations have been put forward for the plane’s premature descent.
India’s minister of state for civil aviation, Murlidhar Mohol, confirmed that sabotage is among the possible causes being explored by crash investigators.
Speaking with NDTV’s Jitendra Dixit, he described the crash as an ‘unfortunate incident’ but said that India’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) were not ruling out any theories.
He added; ‘The AAIB has begun a full investigation into it. It is being probed from all angles, including any possible sabotage.
‘The CCTV footage are being reviewed and all angles are being assessed, several agencies are working on it.’
The plane generated a giant fireball after plummeting to the ground less than 40 seconds after takeoff, leading many to question if sabotage was at play
A section of the plane lies wedged in a building following the devastating crash, with the death toll currently sitting at 260
While there has been feverish speculation around the reasons for the crash, this is the first time that sabotage has been acknowledged as a possibility by an official source.
Online sleuths have questionned if technical tampering was responsible based on the final in-cockpit recordings from the pilots flying Air India flight 171.
Captain Sumeet Sabharwal radioed air traffic control saying: ‘Thrust not achieved… falling… Mayday! Mayday! Mayday!’ – suggesting he did not have full control of the aircraft.
Another factor cited is the fact that the plane suffered a double engine failure, a very rare occurrence in natural conditions.
However, there is a historical precedent for bird strikes knocking out both engines simultaneously.
The best known is US Airways Flight 1549, which suffered double engine failure in 2009 after being hit by a flock of Canada geese shortly after taking off from New York’s LaGuardia Airport.
The plane’s captain Chesley ‘Sully’ Sullenberger managed to land the aircraft in a New York river – the so called ‘miracle on the Hudson’, which was eventually made into a film, Sully, starring Tom Hanks.
Despite the ferocity of the fireball created when Air India flight 171 hit the ground, investigators were able to recover the plane’s second black box.
India’s minister of state for civil aviation, Murlidhar Mohol (pictured on June 14, two days after the air disaster) has confirmed that sabotage is among the possible causes being explored by crash investigators
Last images: A video posted to social media appeared to show the plane descending in a controlled manner with a high nose angle and landing gear deployed
Wreckage: People look at the debris of an Air India plane that crashed in Ahmedabad, located in India’s Gujarat state
Response: Rescue team members work as smoke rises at the site in Ahmedabad, India
The Aircraft Accidents Investigation Bureau is now pouring over the footage that should enable them to create a second-by-second reconstruction of events as they unfolded.
The Cockpit Voice Recorder (CVR) captures all audio from the cockpit, including pilot conversations, radio transmissions, warning alarms and ambient mechanical sounds.
It will allow investigators to finally understand what happened in the moments leading up to one of the world’s worst aviation disasters in a decade.
Planes usually carry two black boxes – one records flight data, such as altitude and speed and the other records sound from the cockpit, so investigators can hear what the pilots are saying and listen for any unusual noises.
Besides sabotage, some analysts have suggested a catastrophic technical fault could be responsible for the crash.
The Ahmedabad disaster was the first time a Boeing Dreamliner has crashed since the models introduction in 2011.
However, there has been concerns about the model’s engines, including a mid-air drive on a LATAM Airlines flight last year which was reportedly casued by a faulty seat in the cockpit and left more than 50 passengers injured.
During hearings in Washington last year, a former Boeing engineer turned whistleblower urged the aerospace giant to ground all Dreamliners.
Location: The siblings had been a few seats apart onboard the plane, with survivor Vishwash sitting at 11A and his younger brother positioned at 11J on the other side of the aisle
Wreckage showing the tail section of the Air India Boeing 787-8 in a residential area near the airport in Ahmedabad on June 14, 2025
Ed Pierson, a former high-level Boeing manager who testified at the congressional hearings, said it was ‘possible’ safety concerns raised by himself and others in 2019 could have affected the Gatwick-bound aircraft.
At the time, his fellow whistleblower Sam Saklephour voiced concerns about the air giant’s manufacturing of 787 aircrafts – claims Boeing refuted and said it had full confidence in the model.
When asked if concerns could flagged by Salehpour could have been present in other 787s in general, Mr Pierson said: ‘It is possible.
‘Because the problems he identified that’s how the planes were being built for a long time so the testimony that he gave and I gave that day all proceeded this India accident.’
Mr Pierson, who previously spoke of manufacturing concerns of the company’s 737 Max aircraft told NDTV production facilities for that plane in particular, were ‘chaotic and dangerous’.
‘There were a lot of indications of chaotic and dangerous manufacturing. We were rushing to build the planes to get them out of the door. Employees were pressured to get their work done.
‘There was parts issues. We had aircraft systems issues that I remembered we were having difficulty with. And I remember being very concerned that we were taking unnecessary risks,’ he added.
Air India flight 171’s crash came just weeks after Boeing came to a £1.1billion settlement with the US justice department to avoid prosecution over two crashes in 2018 and 2019 involving its 737 MAX model.
