By Abhijith Ganapavaram
NEW DELHI (Reuters) -India’s aviation regulator has asked Air India to inspect an emergency power system on some Boeing Dreamliner aircraft after the system unexpectedly deployed during a flight earlier this month.
The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has also asked the U.S. planemaker to submit a “comprehensive report” that outlines preventive measures that can be taken to prevent deployment of the system, known as the Ram Air Turbine (RAT), the regulator said in a statement received on Monday. It has asked Boeing to provide details on similar uncommanded RAT deployments on 787s globally.
Reuters reported last week that the DGCA had asked Boeing for more information after the incident, which occurred during an October 4 flight to Birmingham in Britain from the northern Indian city of Amritsar. The pilots did not report any related abnormality and the aircraft landed safely. It later returned to commercial service.
The unexpected deployment has come under scrutiny after the system was also activated shortly before the June 12 crash of an Air India 787 that killed 260 people. A preliminary report by Indian investigators showed the plane’s fuel engine switches had almost simultaneously flipped from run to cutoff just after takeoff.
India’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) has gathered details and is analyzing the Birmingham flight incident but it had not seen a connection between the unexpected RAT deployment on October 4 and the June 12 crash, a source with direct knowledge of the matter told Reuters last week.
The DGCA has asked Air India to reinspect the RAT on aircraft where a system that regulates distribution of power was recently replaced. It was not immediately clear how many aircraft were affected.
Spokespersons for Boeing, Air India and the AAIB did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
On Friday, the Federation of Indian Pilots sent a letter to India’s civil aviation minister Ram Mohan Naidu, asking the government to ground all Air India 787s and check their electrical systems.
Naidu’s office, Boeing and Air India did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the letter.
(Reporting by Abhijith Ganapavaram in New Delhi and Kashish Tandon in Bengaluru; Editing by Mrigank Dhaniwala)
