Delayed probe report on Kozhikode air crash to be made public soon: Scindia

The final probe report on the Air India Express Kozhikode air crash that took place on August 7, 2020 that has been delayed for over eight months will be made public in a “few days”, Union civil aviation minister Jyotiraditya Scindia said on Thursday.

Hindustan Times on January 21 had reported that the final probe report on the Air India Express crash at Kerala’s Kozhikode airport due for submission in January 2021 would be delayed by two months. A civil aviation ministry order, reviewed by HT, had granted a two-month extension to the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB), the regulatory body in charge of the investigation, to submit the report. Following an extension till March the final probe report is yet to be drafted and released.

“The report has been submitted to the Ministry. We will release it in the next couple of days into public domain,” Jyotiraditya Scindia said in response to a question during a press conference on Thursday.

In its January order granting an extension the aviation ministry had said there was a delay due to the Covid-19 pandemic. “There is a delay being experienced in the Test Reports of components, and an extension of two months has been granted for submission of the draft final report of Investigation into VT-AXH Accident,” the January order said.

“It is an onerous task and a very big responsibility as it is seen by 194 countries,” AAIB DG Aurobindo Handa said.

The Air India Express Boeing-737 plane repatriating Indians stranded in Dubai due to the pandemic overshot the runway in heavy rain, skidded off the table-top runway and broke into two parts after crashing nose-first into the ground. The flight was carrying 190 passengers and crew. It was the deadliest commercial aviation disaster in the country in 10 years and claimed 20 lives. Another Air India Express flight from Dubai overshot Mangalore’s table-top runway in 2010. It slid down a hill and left 158 people dead.

The AAIB in August last year appointed a team of five investigators to lead the probe and submit a report within five months.

AAIB director-general Aurobindo Handa appointed Captain SS Chahar, a former Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA)-designated examiner for pilots of B737NG aircraft, as the investigator-in-charge tasked with completing its inquiry and submitting the report.

He is assisted by Operations Expert Ved Prakash, Senior Aircraft Maintenance Engineer-B737 Mukul Bhardwaj, Group Captain YS Dahiya, Aviation Medicine Expert, and Jasbir Singh Larhga, Deputy Director AAIB.

The bureau’s role is to conduct an independent aircraft accident investigation, obtain a preliminary report to assist in setting up a committee of inquiry in accordance with International Civil Aviation Organisation rules.

DGCA, the aviation regulator, a day after the crash, had announced that the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder were recovered from the crash site. They can help in determining the cause of the crash. The cockpit voice recorder keeps a recording of all the conversations taking place in a plane’s cockpit. The flight data recorder logs data such as airspeed, altitude, and fuel flow.