Air India crash: Pilots Sabharwal, Kunder remembered as calm, skilled men

Business Standard

3 days ago

Seconds before Air India flight 171 crashed while ascending from Ahmedabad, the fuel control switches of both its engines were cut off, a preliminary investigation report said on Saturday, suggesting a catastrophic pilot error.
The Airlines Pilots Association of India disagreed with the report, saying the investigation is "shrouded in secrecy" appears to be biased against the pilot and has come to a conclusion hastily.
The report by the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AIIB) neither concluded any reason for the switches moving nor apportioned explicit blame for the crash. It also did not identify the pilots in the voice recording.
At the controls was First Officer Clive Kunder, 32, while Sumeet Sabharwal, a veteran with 30 years of experience at Air India, was the senior cockpit occupant in command monitoring the flight.
Below are brief profiles of the two pilots:
Captain Sumeet Sabharwal: The 56-year-old veteran with 30 years of experience at Air India had logged 15,638 flying hours, including 8,596 on the Boeing 787. He was also an Air India instructor.
Sabharwal had called his family from the airport on the fateful day, assuring them that he would contact them again after landing in London.
His colleagues and co-pilots in Mumbai remembered him as a gentleman, known not just for his flying skills, but for his grounded nature.
Co-pilot Clive Kunder: The 32-year-old had 3,403 hours of flying experience, with 1,128 on the Dreamliner.
A resident of Goregaon in Mumbai, Kunder had worked for a year as an aeronautical engineer before successfully chasing his dream to be a pilot.
His neighbours remembered him as a good-natured man fond of sports who used to play cricket in the building compound.
On June 12, the London-bound Boeing 787 Dreamliner began to lose thrust almost immediately after taking off from the Ahmedabad airport and ploughed into a medical college hostel, killing all but one of the 242 onboard and another 19 on the ground in the deadliest aviation accident in a decade.
The AAIB report said the aircraft took off at 08:08:39 UTC (13:38:39 IST) and at about 08:09:05 UTC (13:39:05 IST) one of the pilots transmitted 'MAYDAY MAYDAY MAYDAY'.
According to a chronology laid out in the report by the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau, both fuel control switches - which are used to turn the engines off - were moved to the cutoff position almost immediately after takeoff.
At the Jal Vayu Vihar housing complex in Mumbai's Powai area, where Captain Sabharwal lived, his family members refused to speak to media persons.
Security personnel at the entrance stopped journalists from entering.
Captain Sabharwal's 92- year-old father Pushkaraj Sabharwal was seen entering the building.
A senior citizen, who lives in the same complex, said the media should not bother Sabharwal's aged father and other family members, as they know nothing.
"Do you think the pilots will give up their lives deliberately," he asked.
"Whatever information you want to collect, you should collect it from Ahmedabad," the man said, adding that the "owner of the airline company" should be asked about what went wrong with the plane.
In Goregaon's Ram Mandir locality, family members of Co-pilot Clive Kunder were not present in their home.
(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)