Air India Flight Diverted to Dubai: Technical Issue

Mumbai, Oct 10 (PTI) Tata Group-owned Air India on Friday said its Delhi-bound flight from Vienna on October 9 was diverted to Dubai due to a technical issue.

The aircraft landed safely at Dubai and underwent necessary checks, it said in a statement, without sharing specific details.

The flight, operated by the same aircraft, departed Dubai at 08:45 hours IST and landed in Delhi at 12:19 hours IST.

Though Air India did not elaborate the "technical issue" due to which the flight was forced to divert to Dubai, the pilots body, Federation of Indian Pilots (FIP) in a letter to the Civil Aviation Minister revealed that the Boeing 787 aircraft "experienced failures across critical systems which included Autopilots, ILS (instrument landing system), flight directors (FDs) and flight control system degradation with no autoland capability."

"Since 16 Jun 25, we have reiterated that all B-787s in the country must be checked thoroughly for the electrical systems. On October 5, RAT (unexpectedly) deployed on the AI-117 (which was being operated by a Boeing 787) while on approach at Birmingham. On October 9, AI-154 from Vienna to Delhi was diverted to Dubai, which had major technical issues where the autopilot system suddenly failed, triggering a series of technical malfunctions," the FIP said.

RAT deploys automatically in the eventuality of a dual engine failure or total electronic or hydraulic failure. It uses wind speed to generate emergency power.

"The pilots could not engage the autopilots due to electrical malfunctions; thus, pilots were constrained to fly manually at night and divert to Dubai. Moreover, the FDs were not available with degraded flight control systems. The aircraft landed safely at Dubai," the FIP said in the letter, while demanding the grounding of the entire B787 fleet and a special DGCA audit of Air India.

FIP had earlier urged aviation safety regulator DGCA to thoroughly check and investigate the electrical system of all Boeing 787 aircraft in the country after a Boeing 787 plane operated by Air India from Amritsar to Birmingham saw deployment of emergency turbine power when it was about to land in the UK city.

These two incidents come after the June 12 Air India's Ahmedabad-London Gatwick plane accident, wherein one of its Boeing 787-8 aircraft crashed into a medical hostel complex soon after take-off from Ahmedabad, killing 260 people.