Captain Randhawa said that his federation is requesting the Civil Aviation Minister to reconstitute the board and include type-rated experts in this investigation board, who are pilots, engineers and air safety experts.The FIP President said that Indian Pilots are among the best in the world. “Indian pilots are among the best in the world. I did not give my opinion to the Wall Street Journal, which had approached me as well, because I am against this American media. They are deliberately giving their own opinion, their own views from this report, while there is nothing like this in the report. So I very strongly condemn this report of the Wall Street Journal and we will take action on it,” he added.Earlier on Wednesday, the Federation of Indian Pilots (FIP) expressed “serious” concern regarding the preliminary findings and public discourse surrounding the crash of Air India flight AI-171 in Ahmedabad.FIP, in an official statement, expressed their dissatisfaction with the exclusion of pilot representatives from the investigation process, objecting to the way in which the preliminary report has been interpreted and presented publicly.”At the outset, we would like to register our dissatisfaction with the exclusion of pilot representatives from the investigation process. We also firmly object to the way in which the preliminary report has been interpreted and presented publicly,” FIP said in an official statement.This statement followed a Reuters report, which cited the Wall Street Journal, claiming that a cockpit recording of dialogue between the two pilots of the Air India flight that crashed last month indicated that the captain turned off the switches that controlled fuel flowing to the plane’s engines.As per Reuters, The Wall Street Journal report cited people familiar with US officials’ early assessment of evidence uncovered in the investigation into the crash, which killed 260 people.The recording suggested that the first officer, who was flying the Boeing aircraft, opened the new tab 787 Dreamliner, and asked the other captain, who was more experienced, why he moved the switches to the “cutoff” position after it climbed off the runway, the report said.The first officer expressed surprise and then panicked, while the captain seemed to remain calm, Reuters reported, citing WSJ. India’s Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), Boeing and Air India have not yet responded to the report.The two pilots involved were Captain Sumeet Sabharwal and First Officer Clive Kunder, who had a total flying experience of 15,638 hours and 3,403 hours, respectively.A preliminary report released last week by India’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau depicted confusion in the cockpit shortly before the June 12 crash and raised fresh questions over the position of the critical engine fuel cutoff switches, the report said.The AI 171 crash of the Boeing Dreamliner 787-8 aircraft in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, killed 260 people, including 229 passengers, 12 crew members, and 19 people on the ground.
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