One Year After Air India Plane Crash Kills 260, Families Still Await Answers

June 13, 2026 marks one year since an Air India Boeing 787 Dreamliner crashed into the densely populated Meghani Nagar suburb of Ahmedabad in Gujarat, western India, killing 260 people.

Relatives of the victims gathered at the site on Friday (June 12) for a memorial, but they have yet to receive definitive answers about why the aircraft crashed shortly after takeoff from a nearby airport.

Air India Flight AI171, a Boeing 787 Dreamliner bound for London Gatwick, slammed into a medical college dormitory in the Meghani Nagar residential area near the international airport on the outskirts of Ahmedabad. According to flight-tracking site Flightradar24, the aircraft's last signal was received seconds after takeoff at 1:38 p.m. local time (8:08 a.m. GMT). The plane reached an altitude of 625 feet (190 meters) before plunging to the ground outside the airport. The crew issued a mayday distress call to air traffic control just before communication was lost.

Human Toll

Of the 242 people aboard, only one passenger survived. The victims included 169 Indian nationals and 52 British citizens. In total, 260 people died, including 19 people on the ground near the crash site. Another 67 people nearby were injured.

The sole survivor aboard the plane, Vishwash Kumar Ramesh, a British citizen, lost his brother in the disaster. Ramesh’s representative, Sanjiv Patel, said Air India paid Ramesh £21,500 ($28,800) in compensation to support his wife and five-year-old son. It remains unclear whether other families received similar payments.

Relatives of the victims gathered Friday at a conference in Ahmedabad organized by lawyers, aviation experts, and safety specialists. They plan to hold a candlelight vigil after sunset.

Preliminary Findings and Controversy

This was the first fatal passenger jet crash involving a Boeing 787 Dreamliner, a model introduced in 2011. Under international aviation law, India’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) released a preliminary report one month after the disaster.

The 15-page report revealed that fuel supply to the plane’s engines was cut just before the crash, raising questions about possible pilot error. The report also released cockpit conversation between the captain and first officer about the fuel supply being cut — two short phrases that led to speculation about pilot suicide.

The preliminary report did not specify why the fuel switch was turned off — whether due to pilot error or a technical malfunction. It also issued no safety recommendations to Boeing or engine maker GE Aerospace, suggesting no technical problems were detected. The report drew sharp criticism.

The crash also dealt a blow to Air India during a sensitive phase of its post-privatization restructuring, slowed by supply chain hurdles, Pakistan’s airspace ban on Indian carriers, and more recently the U.S.-Israel conflict with Iran.

Latest Developments in the Investigation

Under international rules, the final report must be issued “if possible” within a year of the crash. However, because the investigation is incomplete, the AAIB is expected to release only an interim report at this stage. Media reports citing unnamed sources say Indian investigators will delay the final report due to the need to complete engine analysis.

The Indian Pilots Federation has urged investigators to seek more technical data from Boeing and Air India to “rebut the pilot suicide theory the AAIB is considering.” Federation president Charanvir Randhawa said: “Issuing only an interim report will lead to further speculation and misunderstanding. We have asked the Indian government and the AAIB not to release any interim report.”

An initial assessment by U.S. officials last year (according to Reuters) suggested that cockpit voice recordings of the two pilots on the Air India 787 before the crash supported the view that the captain cut off the fuel flow to the engines. But the AAIB at the time said it was too early to reach a firm conclusion.

Investigators conducted engine tests in April and traveled to France last month as part of analyzing the engine control unit. Bloomberg reported Thursday (June 11) that the final report could be issued within three months, after completing engine studies that were sent to the United States for examination.

The captain’s father has petitioned India’s Supreme Court to order an independent investigation, considering possible causes other than pilot suicide — a cause suspected in several other deadly crashes and confirmed in the case of Germanwings Flight 9525, which crashed into the French Alps in 2015, killing 150 people.