Headlines around the world tied a captain’s positive marijuana test to a terrifying midair plunge. He wasn’t the one flying. The first officer was at the controls, and Airbus says the aircraft registered pressure losses across all three hydraulic systems and that key flight controls stopped responding for four seconds. Every one of those headlines was technically true. Together, they told a story the investigation hasn’t established.
You have probably seen some version of this story by now. An Air India jet flying from Phuket to Delhi dropped roughly 300 feet in cruise, injured 24 people, and its captain later tested positive for marijuana.
Both of those things are true.
Here is what a great many of those headlines left out. The captain who tested positive was not the pilot flying the airplane when it happened. According to his own account to investigators, first reported by Hindustan Times, he was not in his seat. He was standing behind the first officer, and when the aircraft moved, it threw him to the cockpit floor.
The first officer was the one at the controls.
What Happened at 36,000 Feet
Air India flight AI2379, an Airbus A320neo registered VT-EXO, left Phuket on the morning of August 4 with 137 passengers and eight crew members. At around 9:33 a.m. India time, cruising near 36,160 feet over the Odisha coast, the aircraft lost roughly 300 feet of altitude. Twenty passengers and four cabin crew members were hurt. The plane stayed airborne for about another hour and a half and landed safely in Delhi.
Air India first described the event as turbulence. It later dropped that description and called it a sudden loss of altitude. Indian authorities classified it as a serious incident, and the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau is investigating with technical help from Airbus and France’s …
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Author: Javier Hasse / High Times
