Keystone Law announced that it has been formally retained by a number of British families who lost loved ones in the crash to address “serious questions”
Keystone Law, a major London law firm, on Thursday, listed two very ‘serious’ questions in the London-bound Air India AI171 plane crash soon after take-off from Ahmedabad three weeks ago that killed 260 people.
This comes as the law firm announced that it has been formally retained by a number of British families who lost loved ones in the crash to address “serious questions” once the preliminary report into the investigation is released.
According to the PTI report, Keystone Law said its aviation team, supported by international experts in the field, is focused on two specific areas of concern: the “cause of the Ram Air Turbine (RAT) deployment, and then the sequential loss of thrust in both engines.”
The firm’s aviation partners, James Healy-Pratt and Owen Hanna, are said to be “working closely” with around 20 British families regarding the coronial process, as well as the London lawyers appointed by Air India and its aviation insurers, dealing with interim payments.
“This is an incredibly sensitive time for the AI171 families, and we are supporting them through the various processes in the UK and the US. On the air safety aspects, our technical investigation team believes that the RAT was automatically deployed. This suggests a serious systems failure around the critical point of take-off,” Healy-Pratt was quoted as saying by PTI.
Healy-Pratt told the news agency that the law firm’s focus is on the preliminary investigation report, which is expected later this month.
“We are preparing our families for several eventualities, depending on the evidence, because we’ve always been very clear that our advice is evidence-based,” explained the lawyer.
“We have focused on the reasons why the RAT was deployed and the reasons why there was not enough thrust. Those are the two core issues our families need and want answers about, and that’s what we hope the Black Boxes will reveal, and there’ll be some mention of that in the preliminary accident report in 10 days’ time,” he said.
Based on its findings, Healy-Pratt indicated that the “path to justice and truth” may well be in the High Court in London or in the US federal court of Virginia against Boeing.
Keystone Law began by advising impacted families based in the UK and is now said to have also been approached by some in India.
The Ahmedabad Air India crash
The London Gatwick airport-bound Air India flight AI171, a Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner, had crashed near the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International Airport on June 12. It resulted in the death of all but one of the 242 passengers and crew on board, as well as 19 deaths on the ground as it crashed into the hostel block of the city’s BJ Medical College.
The UK Air Accidents Investigation Branch and Disaster Victim Identification have been assisting the Indian authorities with the technical safety investigation as well as the DNA identification, as 52 British nationals are among the victims of the tragedy.
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