The Centre on Saturday set up a high-level multi-disciplinary panel to ascertain the “root cause” of the crash of the London-bound Air India plane in Ahmedabad and assess any contributing factors including mechanical failure, human error and regulatory compliances even as the death toll in the disaster rose to 270.
As the panel headed by Union Home Secretary Govind Mohan was mandated to give its report in three months, Civil Aviation Minister K Rammohan Naidu said aviation regulator DGCA has ordered “extended surveillance” for the Tata-owned airline’s Boeing 787 Dreamliner series planes. The Civil Aviation ministry said the committee will not be a substitute to other probes being conducted by relevant organisations.
In a post on X, Air India said it has done one-time safety checks on nine of its Boeing 787 Dreamliners and is on track to complete the checks on the remaining 24 such planes as directed by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation(DGCA).The carrier now has 26 Boeing 787-8s and seven Boeing 787-9s in its fleet.
All but one of the 242 passengers and crew on board the Boeing 787-8(AI171) and another 29 persons including five MBBS students on the ground were killed when the aircraft came down on Thursday moments after taking off from the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International Airport before falling inside the nearby campus of the state-run BJ Medical College in Meghaninagar area and going up in flames.
As investigators pore over wreckage at the BJ Medical College hostel and canteen complex for clues after the crash, Air India officials said the ill-fated airplane underwent comprehensive maintenance checks in June 2023 and was due for the next scheduled comprehensive checks in December this year.
The right side engine of the nearly 12-year-old aircraft was overhauled and installed in March 2025, while an inspection of the left side engine was done as per the engine manufacturer’s protocol in April 2025, the officials said. The aircraft was powered by GEnx engines, manufactured by GE Aerospace.
The officials, who did not want to be named, also claimed there were no issues with the engines or the aircraft.
“Around 270 bodies have been brought to the Ahmedabad Civil Hospital so far from the plane crash site,” President of Junior Doctors association of BJ Medical College, Dr Dhaval Gameti, said. The death toll in the country’s worst ever air disaster in three decades was earlier put by authorities at 265.
With probe agencies looking into all possible causes for the crash, including loss of thrust in both engines of the aircraft, multiple bird strikes, or a potential flap issue, Naidu told reporters in Delhi that decoding of the Black box is going to give “in-depth insight” into what happened moments before the tragedy.
The Digital Flight Data Recorder (DFDR), commonly known as Black box, was recovered from the “rooftop” of the hostel building at the crash site on Friday.
There was no word yet on recovery of another Black box — the Cockpit Voice Recorder(CVR).
This instrument records radio transmissions and other sounds in the cockpit, such as conversations between the pilots and engine noises.
Naidu said India has very strict aviation safety standards and robust protocols, and everything will be done to further improve safety.