India would not allow a UN investigator
to join a probe of a crashed Air India jet that some safety
experts had criticized for delays in analysis of crucial black
box data, two senior sources familiar with the matter told
Reuters.
Earlier this week, the United Nations aviation agency took
the unusual step of offering India one of its investigators to
provide assistance following the Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner
crash killing 260 people in Ahmedabad on June 12.
Previously, the International Civil Aviation Organization
has deployed investigators to help with certain probes, such as
the downing of a Malaysian plane in 2014 and a Ukrainian
jetliner in 2020, but those times the agency had been asked for
assistance.
ICAO had asked for the investigator who was in India to be
given observer status, but Indian authorities refused the offer,
the sources said. The news was first reported on Thursday by the
Indian news channel Times Now.
India’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB), which
is leading the probe into the world’s deadliest aviation
accident in a decade, did not return a request for comment. ICAO
was not immediately available for comment.
India’s civil aviation ministry said on Thursday that
investigators downloaded flight recorder data around two weeks
after the crash.
Previously, safety experts had questioned a lack of
information about the probe, including the status of the
combined black box unit recovered on June 13, along with a
second set that was found on June 16.
Questions were also raised on whether the recorders would be
read in India or in the U.S. since the National Transportation
Safety Board is participating in the investigation. The Indian
government held only one press conference on the incident, and
no questions were taken.
Under international rules known throughout the industry by
their legal name “Annex 13,” the decision of where to read
flight recorders should be made immediately in case the evidence
obtained could avert future tragedies.
Earlier this week, an Indian aviation ministry official who
declined to be named said the department has been “following all
the ICAO protocols.” The official added that media
representatives have made updates on important events.
Most air crashes are caused by multiple factors, with a<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
India would not allow a UN investigatorto join a probe of a crashed Air India jet that some safetyexperts had criticized for delays in analysis of crucial blackbox data, two senior sources familiar with the matter toldReuters.Earlier this week, the United Nations aviation agency tookthe unusual step of offering India one of its investigators toprovide […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-31127","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\n