Opinion: Enough armchair analysis, please

The ashes in Ahmedabad hadn’t even cooled before the internet and media started scrambling to advance theories and questions and rumours about the causes of the crash of Air India Flight 171, which killed 261 people in the first ever fatal hull loss of a 787 Dreamliner on 12 June.

Initially, of course, the speculation revolved mainly around the prospect of a mechanical failure. Boeing, the manufacturer of the 787-8 that crashed into a building seconds after take-off as the pilots struggled to gain altitude, has not exactly had the best reputation over the past few years. With the crashes of two 737 MAX 8 planes due to faulty software, the door plug blowing off a 737 MAX 9, and numerous accusations and whistleblower reports of lax safety standards at its manufacturing plants and external suppliers, the planemaker looked easy to blame.

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