The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has concluded there was no glitch in the grounded Boeing Dreamliner, and asked Air India to train its pilots on the procedures to use the fuel control switches in the wide-bodied aircraft.
In its statement released on Tuesday, the regulator said the fuel switch issue reported on Air India Boeing 787-8 was not due to a mechanical fault, but due to incorrect handling. It has not directly blamed pilots or the crew in the report.
Air India had grounded a London-Bengaluru Dreamliner, after the pilot raised possible defects with fuel control switches. The flight had landed in Bengaluru on Monday.
Fuel control switches are critical cockpit components used by pilots to manage fuel flow to aircraft engines. Any abnormality in the switch is treated as a safety-critical issue and requires immediate technical assessment by both the airline and the aircraft manufacturer.
The fuel switches were at the center of last year’s crash involving an Air India Dreamliner, which killed 260 people in Gujarat, triggering tighter scrutiny of the airline.
“Both left and right switches were checked and found satisfactory… When full force was applied parallel to the base plate, the switch remained secure,” the DGCA statement said. “However, applying external force in an incorrect direction caused the switch to move easily from run to cutoff due to the angular base plate allowing slip when pressed improperly with finger or thumb.”
The DGCA said the airline was being “advised to circulate the Boeing recommended procedure for the operation of fuel cut off switch to its crew members”.
Air India is yet to respond to the DGCA’s findings.
Lingering doubts
Experts are, however, not convinced with the DGCA’s explanation.
“The ‘external force’ referred to in the DGCA statement appears to imply a crew action, as the DGCA states that the switch would not move from run to cutoff unless external force was applied in an incorrect direction,” said Sanjay Lazar, an aviation expert and chief executive of Avialaz Consulting, a Pune-based aviation safety consulting firm.
“Given that no one else is present in the cockpit near these switches in these flight situations, the wording seems to suggest that the switch movement in this instance (AI-132 LHR-BLR) was caused by the improper application of external force by the flight crew,” Lazar said.
Mark D. Martin, aviation consultant and chief executive at Gurugram-based Martin Consulting said he thinks the DGCA is downplaying the “gravity of the defects”.
“The fuel switch has to lock and stay locked, irrespective of any inadvertent external force from any direction, position, or angle. This defies the very idea of a mechanical lock. Any and all external force should not allow any travel of the switch from run to cutoff,” he said. “The DGCA should have ordered an immediate comprehensive check of all Boeing 787 fuel switches to establish and verify the anomaly before coming out with a statement.”
“The repercussions I see with this is that pilots and peer regulators globally will not accept the DGCA position, and in turn take arbitration steps to not fly if no proper action on the switch-maker is recommenced,” Martin added.
CS Randhawa, the president of the Federation of Indian Pilots, said, the airline pilot should have actually raised the issue at Heathrow, rather than at Bengaluru. “The issue of a possible fuel switch defect should have been noted in Heathrow/London itself, and not in Bengaluru,” he said. “At least, the pilot did the right thing by raising the issue. Also, as a precautionary measure, the DGCA should order a thorough check of the Boeing fleet in question.”
The DGCA has not responded to emailed questions by mint.
The airline’s action
Earlier in the day, Air India sought help from Boeing to evaluate on a priority basis the issues with the grounded Dreamliner jet.
The Tata-backed airline flagged a potential defect in a fuel control switch on one of its Boeing 787 aircraft, a Dreamliner, and reached out to the US-based aircraft manufacturer for priority evaluation, according to an internal communication seen by mint.
The letter, addressed to Boeing 787 pilots, by Manish Uppal, senior vice-president flight operations at Air India, on 3 February said that the airline’s engineering team reported the issue involving the fuel control switch latch and, as a precautionary measure, initiated fleet-wide re-inspection of the component across its 787 fleet.
“Following the reported defect involving a fuel control switch on one of our B787 aircraft, engineering has escalated the matter to Boeing for priority evaluation,” the letter said.
The letter mentioned that while Air India awaits Boeing’s response, company engineers, “out of abundance of caution” have initiated precautionary fleet-wide inspection of the switch latch.
“To date, no adverse findings have been reported on the aircraft for which this re-inspection is completed,” it said.
Crew members have been asked “to promptly report” any defects observed during operations and to ensure that all required actions are completed prior to accepting the aircraft.
Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner is a key aircraft category for Air India’s long-haul operations. The airline has 33 Dreamliners in its fleet. The last Dreamliner was received in January 2026.
Air India, along with its low-cost carrier Air India Express (AIX), has a fleet size of 297 aircraft comprising Boeing and Airbus models.
Boeing said it was supporting Air India. “We are in contact with Air India and are supporting their review of this matter,” the aircraft maker said in a statement.
