Air India Flight 855

Infobox Airliner accident|name=Air India Flight 855
Date=January 1 1978
Type=Instrument malfunction
Site=Near Bombay, India
Fatalities= 213
Injuries= 0
Aircraft Type= Boeing 747-237B
Origin=Bombay Santacruz Airport
Destination=Dubai International Airport
Operator=Air India
Tail Number= airreg|VT|EBD|disaster
Ship name= "Emperor Ashoka"
Passengers= 190
Crew= 23
Survivors = 0

Air India Flight 855 was a scheduled passenger flight that crashed in the evening of 1 January 1978 about 4 kilometers (1.8 statute miles) off the coast of Bandra, Bombay (now Mumbai), India. All 213 lives on board were lost. The crash is believed to have been caused by the Captain becoming spatially disoriented after the failure of one of the flight instruments in the cockpit.

The aircraft involved was a Boeing 747-237B, registration VT-EBD, named the "Emperor Ashoka". It was the first 747 delivered to Air India. When it was delivered in April 1971, Air India had proclaimed it as the "747th wonder of the world", and in keeping with their Maharaja motif, used the tagline "Your Palace in the Sky" to describe this new aircraft with a detailed external paint scheme and interesting interior design.

The departure was from Bombay's Santacruz Airport, (now called Chatrapati Shivaji International Airport). The plane's destination was Dubai International Airport in Dubai, with Captain Madan L Kukar as the operating pilot.

Approximately one minute after takeoff from runway 27 the pilot made a scheduled right turn while over the Arabian Sea, after which the aircraft briefly returned to a normal level position. Soon the plane began rolling to the left, and never regained level flight.

The cockpit voice recorder recovered from the wreckage revealed the Captain made a verbal comment about his Attitude Indicator (AI) having "toppled", meaning that it was still showing the aircraft in a right bank. The First Officer, whose presumably functional AI was now showing a left bank, said that his AI was also toppled, but there is some belief that the Captain mistakingly took this to mean that both primary AIs were indicating a right bank. It was after sunset and the aircraft was flying over a dark Arabian Sea, leaving the aircrew unable to visually cross-check their AI instrument readings with the actual horizon outside the cockpit windows.

The 747 had a third backup AI in the center instrument panel between the two pilots, and the transcripts of the cockpit conversation show that the Flight Engineer may have been attempting to direct the Captain's attention to that third AI, or perhaps to another instrument called the Turn and Bank Indicator, just five seconds before the plane impacted the sea.

The Captain's mistaken perception of the aircraft situation resulted in his using the flight controls to add more left bank and left rudder, causing the aircraft to rapidly lose altitude. Just 101 seconds after leaving the runway the jet impacted into the Arabian Sea at an estimated 35 degree nose-down angle. There were no survivors among the 190 passengers and 23 crew members.

The partially recovered wreckage revealed no evidence of explosion, fire, or any electrical or mechanical failure, and an initial theory of sabotage was ruled out.

The investigation concluded that the probable cause was "due to the irrational control inputs by the captain following complete unawareness of the attitude as his AI had malfunctioned. The crew failed to gain control based on the other flight instruments."

U.S. Federal District Judge James M. Fitzgerald, in a 139-page decision issued November 11985, rejected charges of negligence against the Boeing Company, Lear Siegler Inc, and the Collins Division of Rockwell International Corporation in a suit related to the crash. [http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/boeing_company/index.html?match=all&query=air+india+crash&submit.x=17&submit.y=11&submit=Search]

ee also

*Flash Airlines Flight 604
*Spatial disorientation
*Sensory illusions in aviation
*John F. Kennedy, Jr.#Death

References

* [http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/boeing_company/index.html?match=all&query=air+india+crash&submit.x=17&submit.y=11&submit=Search New York Times archived article search]
* [http://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=19780101-1 Accident description at Aviation Safety Network]
*

External links

* [http://www.aero.ca/News1_96.html Design Induced Errors] - Discusses the crash
* [http://www.airliners.net/search/photo.search?regsearch=VT-EBD&distinct_entry=true Pre-crash photos of 747 VT-EBD at airliners.net]