Air India flight makes emergency landing at Delhi due to engine fire

Air India has said it is investigating an engine fire that forced one of its flights to carry out an emergency landing in Delhi, marking the second safety-related incident involving the airline within a single day, News.Az reports, citing the Independent.

The Thursday night flight from Bengaluru in southern India declared a “full emergency” after the cockpit crew received an alert indicating a possible engine fire as the aircraft was approaching Delhi.

Flight AI2802, an Airbus A320 carrying 171 passengers, landed safely at Delhi airport, the airline confirmed.

Air India said the fire warning was later confirmed to be genuine, and the crew followed standard operating procedures in carrying out the emergency landing.

The airline added: “Air India is immediately initiating a full investigation into the cause of the incident in coordination with the relevant regulatory authorities.”

The fire was extinguished after the aircraft landed at around 9:30 p.m., and the plane was subsequently towed away from the runway. All passengers were safely disembarked.

The incident occurred just hours after another Air India aircraft was grounded following a tailstrike at Bengaluru airport.

An airline spokesperson said that the aircraft, an Airbus A321 arriving from Delhi, “experienced a tailstrike during landing” but came to a safe stop, with all passengers and crew disembarking normally.

A tailstrike refers to a situation in which the rear underside of an aircraft makes contact with the runway during takeoff or landing. Following such incidents, aircraft undergo detailed inspections to assess possible structural damage.

According to NDTV, a Boeing 747 had taken off shortly before the Air India flight landed, resulting in strong turbulence. The aircraft’s pilots may have encountered unstable landing conditions and attempted a go-around maneuver, which is a standard procedure used to abort a landing and attempt another approach. The tailstrike may have occurred during this maneuver.

Air India, owned by the Tata Group, has been facing a challenging period, including mounting financial losses as well as legal and regulatory scrutiny following a crash involving one of its Boeing 787 Dreamliners in June of the previous year, which killed 241 of the 242 people on board and 19 people on the ground in western India.

News.Az 

By Nijat Babayev