The pilots have noticed something so serious that it necessitates a mayday call. It is the first and only thing to do in that situation, to declare emergency via mayday, he says.
Gustafsson does not want to speculate about any reasons for the violent crash, where all on board are believed to have perished, but says that Indian authorities will now be responsible for the investigation together with representatives from Boeing.
The process follows an international protocol with the ambition to find underlying causes, and with respect for the process, we are very cautious about speculating about what may have happened, says Tomas Gustafsson, pilot and chairman of the flight safety committee in the Swedish pilots' association.
Safe aircraft type
The current aircraft, a Boeing 787 Dreamliner, is according to Gustafsson not an accident-prone aircraft type.
Boeing's reputation took a real blow in connection with the two accidents with the aircraft model 737 Max 8 in 2018 and 2019. Above all, they received criticism for not choosing to "ground" the aircraft after the first accident, he says and adds:
The aircraft type involved in today's accident has not had that kind of problems at all.
Fully fueled plane
Video clips from the crash in Ahmedabad in northwestern India show a burning wreck and large clouds with thick, black smoke. That the plane was fully fueled before the long flight to London is believed to have contributed to the violent course of the crash.
- A fire engineer would absolutely agree with that. When you have a plane heavily loaded with fuel, it increases the intensity of the explosion and the fire.
