A view shows the wreckage of an Air India aircraft, certain for London’s Gatwick Airport, which crashed during take-off from an airport in Ahmedabad, India June 12, 2025.
Adnan Abidi | Reuters
An Air India plane that was certain for London and carrying 242 people crashed seconds after takeoff in western India on Thursday, killing all but one person on board the Boeing 787 Dreamliner.
The crash killed a minimum of 270 people in Gujarat state, officials said Saturday.
It marked the primary crash of a Boeing 787 Dreamliner and was the deadliest plane crash in years.
Here’s what to know:
What type of plane was it?
The aircraft was a Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner. It’s a well-liked twin-aisle jet used for longer routes.
This plane’s first flight was in December 2013 and it was handed over to Air India in January 2014, in accordance with aviation-data firm Cirium.
Air India had 34 of them in service as of Thursday, including this plane, and it had plans to order a minimum of 20 more, Cirium said. The airline has been increase its fleet with modern jets from each Boeing and rival Airbus, and installing more luxurious cabins.
There are greater than 1,100 Dreamliners flying worldwide.
What happened on this flight?
Preliminary data shows the signal from the plane was lost at 1:38 p.m. local time, lower than a minute after takeoff from Ahmedabad’s Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International Airport, in accordance with flight-tracker Flightradar24.
The aircraft reached maximum altitude of 625 feet, though airport altitude is about 200 feet, Flightradar noted.
It shouldn’t be clear why the plane so quickly lost altitude before it crashed right into a fireball in a residential area. Other fatalities on the bottom have been reported to local media.
Air crashes could be attributable to a wide range of aspects, from mechanical issues to wildlife to pilot error, and sometimes involve multiple problem.
What is going to investigators have a look at?
Responders will comb the rubble for the so-called black boxes: the cockpit and flight data recorders. Those will give crash investigators clues about what was happening on the flight.
Crash investigators will have a look at all the things from the airline’s maintenance records to the pilots’ maneuvers, the position of the aircraft in addition to slats and flaps on the wings, the plane’s takeoff weight and configuration, the pilots’ training and up to date rest, and weather conditions on the recent day, when temperatures were about 100 degrees Fahrenheit.
They may even examine video from the incident, including footage of the aircraft taking off from Ahmedabad, where its landing gear appeared to stay down after takeoff, which is very usual, pilots for major airlines told CNBC.
Under international protocols, the country where the incident occurred will lead the investigation while the plane’s manufacturer, Boeing, and the aircraft’s engine maker, GE Aerospace, in addition to U.S. federal crash investigators will participate.
There have been manufacturing and quality concerns about Dreamliners before. Are they related?
It shouldn’t be immediately clear, and a final report on the crash causes may not be available until next 12 months, but some experts brushed off a producing issue, partly since the plane has been flying for greater than a decade.
“I do not think this is a producing or production issue,” said Jeff Guzzetti, a retired air safety investigator with the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Aviation Administration.Â
He said it is just too early to inform what the issue — or problems — is, as air crashes often involve several failures.
“It appears the airplane got off the runway with no problem but for some reason was unable to climb,” he said.
Boeing has had problems with the Dreamliner before, but an instantaneous connection wasn’t apparent, experts said.
A whistleblower last 12 months alleged that Boeing took shortcuts on the 787 to cut back bottlenecks and created “excessive stress” on major airplane joints. Boeing denied the accusations.
Deliveries of the aircraft were also grounded for a couple of 12 months until mid-2022 because of producing flaws where parts of the fuselage were improperly spaced.
After the Dreamliner first entered service in 2011, the planes were grounded for inspections as a result of fears of lithium battery fires.
What does this mean for Boeing?
The corporate had already been reeling from two crashes of its bestselling 737 Max jets when a door plug blew out of a brand new Max 9 in early 2024.
The impact on Boeing will rely upon the crash investigation. Demand for brand spanking new planes has still been robust, and airlines often proceed to put orders since the waiting period can stretch several years.
Wolfe Research said in a note Thursday that “we do not see much direct impact on financial performance, but this is definite to sap momentum until some solid clarity is provided.
“We do not see any impact to the production ramp in consequence of this and would expect any impact on demand to be very minimal (and localized) as well,” Wolfe wrote. “A modest risk might be any feedback loop to certification of the [yet-to-be-certified] 777X, but it is rather early to size any risk there.”
Boeing has orders for 900 more Dreamliners, in accordance with its website.
