Investigators have retrieved the flight recorders from the Air India Express Boeing 737-800 which crashed at Kozhikode, as preliminary indications suggest the jet landed long before overrunning.
Civil aviation minister Hardeep Singh Puri says an inquiry has been ordered into the 7 August accident involving flight IX1344 from Dubai, adding that the recorders have been recovered.
“Findings of this investigation will be made public,” he says.
Multiple Indian media outlets are carrying details of purported official preliminary findings given to the ministry – yet to be authenticated by FlightGlobal – confirming the aircraft had initially attempted an ILS approach to runway 28, but executed a go-around owing to heavy rain.
Its crew subsequently requested an approach to the opposite-direction runway 10, and was cleared for the ILS(Z) procedure. The crew was then given weather data, runway conditions, and landing clearance.
The preliminary findings reportedly state that emergency vehicles had already been on standby as a precaution, given the conditions.
Air traffic controllers, they add, observed the aircraft did not touch down until it was abeam taxiway C.
Taxiway C, according to Airports Authority of India charts, is situated about 1,000m from the threshold of runway 10, which has an overall length of 2,860m.
This would have left some 1,860m of the normal runway, not counting a 90m overrun safety area, in which to bring the aircraft to a halt. Weather conditions at the time indicate a tailwind component of around 11kt.
Cirium fleets data lists the aircraft involved as having been configured with 186 seats, which means flight IX1344 had been virtually full. Eighteen fatalities have been confirmed by the carrier.
