Reports of a London-bound plane with over 240 passengers crashed at Ahmedabad. Clouds of smoke.
There were 169 Indian nationals on the flight, as well as 53 Britons, one Canadian national and seven Portuguese nationals, Air India says
Fully fueled 787 taking off, and it crashed at a medical college campus. Awful.
No obvious cause. Experienced crew and good weather conditions.
Weather conditions were stable and clear when the plane crashed, says flight safety expert Marco Chan.
Surface winds were light and visibility was six kilometres, according to the aviation weather forecast at the time, known as METAR.
Chan adds “there were no significant clouds or weather phenomena reported, with no indications of wind shear, storms, or other adverse conditions that might have contributed to the incident”.
Badly handled engine failure? Snakes in the cockpit?
There is a flightradar24 screenshot on Xitter:
Do I read this correctly that they took off at ~ 25 knots? Or is that an artefact of sparse data?
Huh. Belly-flopped.
I can’t see the info since it’s on X. A cite to the real source, not some reposted stuff would be better.
Sparse data is certainly a possibility.
OR it suggests a severe problem with their airspeed indicating system. Which would make it challenging for the pilots to maintain control. But which kinds of malfunctions are routinely checked for very early in the takeoff roll when stopping is still easy.
Is that the first 787 hull loss?
This is the first crash.
There have been a couple of events where the airplane caught fire on the ground and it’s unclear now whether the airplane ended up being written off or repaired. The repair-or-write-off info obviously exists; it’s just not immediately available without some sleuthing.
Well, that looks like just a failure to generate lift. Flaps not extended? Engine failure?
Here is an article from The Times of India. The article includes a video.
They said on the news this morning that it appeared the Air India flight had taken off without its flaps extended, so it couldn’t get any lift. Which reminded me of the 1987 Northwest Airlines Flight 255 flight that crashed soon after takeoff from Detroit Metro Airport. The NTSB determined that it crashed due to the flaps not being extended. The warning alarm for ‘flaps not extended’ had either failed or intentionally been disconnected.
Lotta things have to go wrong mechanically and/or procedurally to take off without flaps. An inadvertent no-flap takeoff is not a guaranteed crash, but that’s the way to bet. After that mistake a whole lot of other luck needs to be on your side to recover successfully: long runway, flat terrain ahead, correct timely diagnosis, not being too hot weather, not too heavy weight, etc. etc.
Note that for most airliners there are a variety of flap settings used for takeoff, and using the wrong setting can also be problematic up to and including triggering a crash. Wrong-flap takeoffs are much more common than no-flap takeoffs.
Even if not necessarily the manufacturer’s fault, this is going to be another black eye for Boeing’s public image given that the 787 was among the newest types. The Airbus A350 and A380 have never had a fatal crash yet.
That’s true - Boeing’s stock is down by a fair amount at least 8% starting off today. My uncle a recreational pilot was echoing what all of you were saying about the plane. I’ve always admired the orientation to detail pilots and attendants have on flights.
Somewhat inconceivable, but Indian media have a quote from a British passenger in row 11 claiming that he heard a loud noise 30 seconds into the flight. He is the only reported survivor so far, but it gives us hope that maybe there could be more.
If the flaps are not in takeoff position, wouldn’t the plane have difficulty climbing above ground effect? This on appears to be a few hundred feet AGL.
Fog of war & all that but AP is still saying no known survivors yet the link has him already being interviewed by the press & what appears to be a photo of him in a hospital bed. 
Added the “breaking news” flag and a date