• Media reports claim recorders too damaged to be processed locally, will be sent to US
• Air India says plane was ‘well-maintained’ before crash

NEW DELHI: India has yet to decide where the black box recorders from last week’s fatal crash of an Air India plane will be analysed, the government said on Thursday.

Earlier, Indian newspaper The Economic Times reported that India planned to send the recorders to the US for analysis as the fire that followed the crash had damaged them to an extent it would be impossible to extract data in India.

The crash of the Boeing Dreamliner moments after take-off from the western city of Ahmedabad on June 12 killed 241 people on board and at least 30 on the ground in the world’s worst aviation disaster in a decade.

The government said in a statement that the decision on where the decoding of the recorders would take place would be made after India’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) has made a “due assessment” of all technical, safety and security considerations.

AAIB’s Director General GVG Yugandhar told Reuters earlier in an emailed response that the Economic Times report was “factually incorrect”, but gave no further details.

The government statement did not explicitly rule out the possibility of the flight recorders being sent to the United States.

It asked for people not to speculate on what it called sensitive matters and stressed the crash probe was progressing with all necessary support from local authorities and agencies.

Planes’ black boxes have two components — the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder — and provide crucial insights for crash investigators, including altitude and airspeed data and pilot conversation records that help determine probable causes of crashes.

The Economic Times report said recorder data would be extracted at the National Transportation Safety Board’s Washington-based laboratory and shared with the AAIB in the presence of Britain’s Air Accidents Investigation Branch.

The NTSB and UK’s AAIB said in separate statements that India’s accident investigating body would release more information on the probe.

Air India said on Thursday that plane was “well-maintained” before it crashed a week ago. As investigators attempt to retrieve data from the plane’s black boxes, the airline said no problems were detected with the jet before the disaster.

“The plane was well-maintained, with its last major check in June 2023,” Air India said in a statement.

“It’s right engine was overhauled in March 2025, and the left engine was inspected in April 2025. Both the aircraft and engines were regularly monitored, showing no issues before the flight,” it said.

Air India said there were 169 Indian passengers, 53 British, seven Portuguese and a Canadian on board the flight, as well as 12 crew members. The pilots were accomplished flyers, according to the airline.

As of Thursday evening, 215 victims have been matched through DNA testing, all but nine of them passengers, according to the civil hospital’s medical superintendent Rakesh Joshi.

Published in Dawn, June 20th, 2025