British Families Of Air India Crash Victims Allege They Received Wrong Bodies: Report
Some families of British victims of the Air India crash reportedly received wrongly identified remains. However, no similar repatriation errors were reported by families in India.
Families of British Air India crash victims were sent wrong bodies, while some received commingled remnants of more than one person killed in the June 12 incident, the Daily Mail has claimed, even though no such blunder was reported in India.
According to the report, some families have claimed the bodies of their loved ones were wrongly identified before being flown to their country. In some cases, families also received commingled remnants of more than one person, which had to be separated before the internment could go ahead.
Two instances of mistaken identity have so far come to light, according to the report.
It claimed the revelation was made after Inner West London coroner Dr Fiona Wilcox sought to verify the identities of the repatriated Britons by matching their DNA with samples provided by the families.
Quoting aviation lawyer James Healy-Pratt, who represents many of the British families, the report stated that at least 12 of the British victims of the Air India crash were repatriated.
Pratt told the publication that his team was waiting for a formal response from Air India and its emergency response contractors, Kenyons International Emergency Services, on the same.
Air India flight AI 171, operated with Boeing 787-8, en route to London Gatwick, crashed soon after takeoff from Ahmedabad on June 12, killing 241 of the 242 passengers onboard and another 19 on the ground.
All victims were identified, and their bodies were handed over to the families for the last rites.
On Tuesday, Air India said it has completed the 'precautionary" inspection of the locking mechanism of the fuel control switch (FCS) on its Boeing 787 and 737 aircraft fleet, and no issues were found.
Aviation safety regulator DGCA last week directed airlines to inspect the fuel switch locking system in their Boeing 787 and 737 planes by July 21 after the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) said in its preliminary report that fuel switches were cut off before the Air India plane crash last month.
In its preliminary report on the Boeing 787-8 crash, AAIB said the fuel supply to both engines of the plane was cut off within a gap of one second, causing confusion in the cockpit soon after takeoff.
Boeing 787s are part of Air India's fleet, while B737s are operated by its low-cost subsidiary Air India Express.
Besides these, other domestic carriers, IndiGo, Spicejet and Akasa, also have these types of aircraft in their operations.
With this, the two airlines, Air India and Air India Express, have complied with the directives of the DGCA issued on July 14, Air India said in the statement.
In 2018, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) flagged the potential disengagement of the fuel control switch locking feature on certain models of Boeing aircraft, including 787s and 737s.
It was mentioned in a Special Airworthiness Information Bulletin (SAIB), but there was no airworthiness directive, indicating that the issue was not a safety concern.
Air India has a total of 33 wide-body Boeing 787s, while Air India Express has around 75 narrow-body 737s.
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