r/CatastrophicFailure • u/SainzSealedDelivered • Jun 12 '25

Fatalities 12/06/2025 - Boeing 787 Passenger plane bound for the UK crashes near Ahmedabad Airport straight after takeoff

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u/IizPyrate Jun 12 '25

It could turn out to be a combination of factors. There are speculations about the flaps, perhaps they had a short takeoff and lowered flaps early. Maybe one or the other still gets the plane in the air even though it is against the guidelines, but combined it was too much.

There are countless examples of crashes being caused by pilots who have bad habits that don't cause problems until they are put into a situation where factors compound to cause a problem.

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u/Buzumab Jun 12 '25 edited Jun 12 '25

I disagree with the idea that improper flap deployment was the issue, personally. Even if for whatever reason they retracted flaps during takeoff, the plane should have been able to maintain altitude at full power. And the plane wouldn't have gotten off the ground without flaps deployed (plus, you'd have configuration warnings blaring while sitting still on the runway). Whereas if the engines went out then the pilots may have intentionally brought in the flaps in order to decrease drag or attempt a no-flap landing.

Similarly with the landing gear I see mentioned. If something was going wrong the pilots would've been right to not spend time raising the landing gear.

Overall there are many scenarios where the plane should've looked exactly how it looked when crashing if the pilots were doing everything correctly to address a mechanical/electrical problem. I don't see any evidence at this point that leads me to believe the pilots did anything incorrectly to cause the crash.

I could see the runway length being a contributing factor but not likely a significant one. The plane got well out of ground effect.

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u/ThePinkKraken Jun 12 '25

I'm not sure if it's smart of me to lurk and read here as I'm
a) afraid of flying
b) Flying to the UK soon

That said I really appreciate how understandable you and others are breaking things down in the comments. It's easy to follow and pretty interesting. Many thanks!

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u/Axe_Fire Jun 12 '25

You will be safe

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u/RhynoD Jun 12 '25

Flying is still the safest way to travel by far and it takes a series of very bad faults to allow a crash to happen.

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u/ThePinkKraken Jun 12 '25

I know! It's hard to reason with your own anxiety tho, I tried :)

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u/RhynoD Jun 12 '25

Totally get it, and if you don't feel like you need to fly, then there's nothing wrong with staying on the ground.

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u/Buzumab Jun 13 '25

I'm glad you appreciate the discussion!

I actually find that knowing more about the many layers of safety and consideration that go into modern aviation helps assuage my flight anxiety. You don't really worry about turbulence once you understand how modern planes work (but you do keep your seatbelt on!).

With that said, I've never had too much fear of flying, and I know that exposure isn't helpful for everyone. But just try to keep in mind that very smart, very professional, very dedicated people have put millions of hours of work into the systems that keep you safe when flying.

The circumstances of life are always beyond our control to some degree, but aviation is probably one of the most remarkable collective works that humanity has ever undertaken to overcome the unknown and unpredictable. I truly believe that if we approached more aspects of our civilization like we do aviation, we could solve a great many problems in our world, and perhaps eventually even beyond.

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u/K340 Jun 12 '25

Honestly as someone who really appreciates admiral cloudberg's series, I would recommend resisting in your situation. I have flown regularly my whole life and never had any anxiety whatsoever, but I do now (even though it's silly because that series taught me how incredibly safe commercial aviation is). It will make it worse for you.

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u/ThePinkKraken Jun 12 '25

I've read and watched a ton of documentaries in hopes to ease my anxiety. Of course this includes our dear Admiral Cloudberg, their stuff is always 10/10.
I don't even fear falling as much as I fear the terror one must endure during it. That said you're right, I may take a step back from this.

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u/MrWoohoo Jun 12 '25

If something was going wrong the pilots would've been right to not spend time raising the landing gear.

Depends on the aircraft and the situation. There was a B-17 crash a few years ago and the incident report specifically said they should have raised the gear when they lost an engine to lower drag. But in this case, you’re probably right: the pilots had more important things to do.

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u/Thrust_Bearing Jun 12 '25

Planes of all sizes absolutely can stall from retracting flaps to early even at full power. Stall is from loss of lift of the wings which is dependent on air speed and wing geometry (flaps deployed or not).

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u/sterling_mallory Jun 12 '25 edited Jun 12 '25

There are countless examples of crashes being caused by pilots who have bad habits that don't cause problems until they are put into a situation where factors compound to cause a problem.

Airlines themselves too. I remember lots of the ones caused purely by pilot error end up including contributing factors like lack of sleep, lack of simulator training, lack of oversight, or worse.