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Boeing Dreamliners
An Air India pilot on Monday flagged a possible defect with the fuel control switch of a Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner, and the matter has been reported to aviation watchdog DGCA. The aircraft operated the flight AI132 from London to Bengaluru, and it landed at Bengaluru on Monday morning, according to sources. In a statement, the airline said it is aware that one of its pilots has reported a possible defect on the fuel control switch of a Boeing 787-8 aircraft. "After receiving this initial information, we have grounded the said aircraft and are involving the OEM to get the pilot's concerns checked on a priority basis. The matter has been communicated to the aviation regulator, DGCA. Air India had checked the fuel control switches on all Boeing 787 aircraft in its fleet after a directive from the DGCA, and had found no issues," the statement said. The incident assumes significance against the backdrop of concerns in certain quarters about the functioning of the fuel control switch in th
Pilots' body ALPA India on Sunday urged aviation watchdog DGCA to withdraw the flight duty time extension for two-pilot Boeing 787 Dreamliner aircraft operations, saying the decision creates a "scenario ripe for fatigue induced errors". For the Boeing 787, two-man flight crew operations, the Flight Duty Time Limitation (FDTL) has been increased to 10.30 hours from 10 hours and the Flight Duty Period (FDP) to 14.00 hours from 13 hours. FDP refers to the time duration when a flight crew member is on duty for operating an aircraft and ends when a plane comes to rest at the end of the flight. Tata Group-owned Air India operates Dreamliners. In a letter to the regulator, Airline Pilots' Association of India (ALPA India) said the whole idea of formulating a Civil Aviation Requirement (CAR) on FDTL was based on extensive research and scientific study on human fatigue and its operational consequences. "The present deviation gives the impression that the DGCA is placing greater considerati
An Air India Dreamliner aircraft faced a technical issue at the Hong Kong airport on Thursday morning and underwent checks before being cleared to fly to Delhi. The Boeing 787-8 plane VT-ANO, which faced the issue on Thursday, is the same aircraft in which the Ram Air Turbine (RAT) was deployed seconds before landing at the Birmingham airport on October 4. "AI315 operating from Hong Kong to Delhi on 16 October was delayed due to a minor issue necessitating a reset of a component. "The aircraft underwent checks, took off after being cleared for operation and landed in Delhi," an airline spokesperson said in a statement to PTI. As per information available on flight tracking website Flightradar24.com, AI315, operated by Boeing 787-8 aircraft VT-ANO, was scheduled to take off from the Hong Kong airport at around 8.50 am (local time) but was delayed and departed at about 11.30 am. The spokesperson also said that at Air India, the safety of passengers remains top priority. On October
Boeing is getting back the ability to perform final safety inspections on 737 Max jetliners and certify the planes for flight more than six years after crashes of the then-new model killed 346 people, the Federal Aviation Administration said Friday. The FAA said it decided to restore the aerospace company's authorisation to issue airworthiness certificates for Max and 787 Dreamliner passenger planes starting Monday following a thorough review of Boeing's ongoing production quality. Federal regulators took full control over 737 Max approvals in 2019, after the second of two crashes that were later blamed on a new software system Boeing developed for the aircraft. The FAA ended the company's right to self-certify Dreamliners in 2022, citing ongoing production quality issues. Going forward, Boeing and FAA inspectors will take weekly turns performing the safety checks that are required before aircraft are cleared for delivery and declared safe to fly. The FAA said the arrangement will