Air India crash: Fuel switches cut off before crash, preliminary report says – live updates

Report does not draw conclusions – but details provided on pilots’ actionspublished at 21:30 British Summer Time

21:30 BST

Theo Leggett
BBC International Business Correspondent

The preliminary report from India’s Air Accident Investigation Bureau into the loss of Air India flight 171, which killed 260 people, has cast attention firmly on the actions of the pilots.

As we just reported, the report says that according to data from the flight recorder both the fuel control switches, which are normally used to switch the engines on or off when on the ground, were moved from the run to the cutoff position shortly after takeoff.

This caused both engines to lose thrust.

It says that in the cockpit voice recording, one of the pilots is heard asking the other why he “did the cutoff”. The other pilot, it says, responded that he did not do so.

It is not specified which voice is which. At the time the aircraft took off, the co-pilot was flying the plane, while the captain was monitoring.

The switches were then moved back into their normal inflight position, something which would automatically start the process of relighting the engines.

One engine, according to the report, was in the process of regaining thrust at the time the aircraft crashed. The other was relit but was not yet regaining thrust.

The report says: “At this stage of investigation, there are no recommended actions to B787-8 and/or GE GEnx-1B engine operators and manufacturers, suggesting that no significant fault has been found with the plane or its engines.”

The report does not draw any conclusions, and points out that the investigation is continuing, but it is clear attention is now being focused on the actions of the pilots.