Early speculations on the fatal crash in India last week of the Air India-operated Boeing 787 Dreamliner point to possible dual-engine failure.

On Thursday (12 June), the aeroplane crashed into a residential area shortly after take-off from Ahmedabad, India, en route to London Gatwick. 

Of the 242 passengers and crew onboard only one person survived, and an additional 38 fatalities occurred on the ground. This makes it the deadliest aviation disaster in India in nearly two decades.

On Friday, India’s civil aviation minister confirmed that the aircraft’s black boxes had been found at the crash site. Flight data, including all the cockpit conversations, will be crucial in determining the cause of the crash. 

While the facts around the crash will only be known once a full analysis of this data is complete, there has been some speculation as to the possible cause of the crash. 

For instance, Captain Steve Scheibner, a former US Navy pilot, told US broadcaster CNBC that, having scrutinised video footage of the flight, he could see what looked to be the deployment of the ram air turbine (RAT), which activates automatically in the event of a massive electrical, hydraulic or dual-engine failure.

Scheibner said: “This puts the dual-engine failure theory in first place. But we’re still at square one. We don’t know why both engines on a 787 flamed out after take-off. It’s a real head-scratcher.”

However, the crash may not be the result of a single factor. 

Ali Elham, professor of multidisciplinary design optimisation in the department of aeronautics and astronautics at the University of Southampton, told The Conversation that often these sorts of crashes involved a “chain of problems”. 

According to The Times of India, a team of officials from Boeing and the FAA have arrived on site to assist in the inquiry, which is being led by India’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau.

As these organisations work together to establish the facts around the crash, no doubt questions will be raised about Boeing's safety record, albeit this is the first fatal crash of a Dreamliner.

Elham said: “Unless investigators identify a recurring technical problem that poses an immediate risk to other 787s, a fleet-wide grounding would be unlikely. Safety is always the top priority, but regulatory responses typically depend on whether an issue appears to be isolated or part of a broader pattern.

“It must be said that the 787 Dreamliner has a very good safety record. It had a very long certification period with the FAA.”

Boeing has not had the best safety track record of late. In 2020, the US-based aircraft manufacturer saw the grounding of its 737 Max planes following two fatal crashes caused by faulty flight control systems.

There have also been incidents of engine parts falling off soon after take-off in 2021 and again in April 2024. 

In January 2024, an Alaska Airlines 737 Max 9 suffered a mid-flight blowout of a plug filling an unused emergency exit, causing rapid decompression of the aircraft. 

These incidents caused the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to investigate Boeing’s manufacturing process. In 2020, the FAA reported that the two Boeing 737 Max crashes were the result of “a disturbing pattern of technical miscalculations and troubling management misjudgments”. 

To add to Boeing’s woes, in April 2025 it was scrambling to find buyers for as many as 50 planes sent back to the company by Chinese airlines following tariff hikes by the Trump administration. 

Major rival Airbus delivered 766 commercial aircraft in 2024 compared with Boeing’s 348.