After the tragic crash of an Air India flight on Thursday, several social media users and some Indian media platforms began spreading claims that the plane had been maintained by a Turkish company. However, these claims have been proven false.
The aircraft, which was flying from Ahmedabad, India to London’s Gatwick Airport, crashed in western India, carrying 242 people. The cause of the crash is still under investigation, but misinformation about the incident spread quickly online.
Some posts showed pictures of airplanes in front of Turkish Technic hangars, a company based in Istanbul that provides aircraft maintenance. These posts wrongly suggested that Turkish Technic was responsible for maintaining the crashed plane.
However, Anadolu’s Fact-Check Line, the fact-checking service by the Turkish news agency Anadolu, investigated the claim. According to their report, the crashed plane was a Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner, not a Boeing 777 as shown in the misleading photos.
A Turkish Technic post from April 9 confirms that the company only maintains Air India’s Boeing 777 aircraft. These planes are serviced at Turkish Technic’s hangars in Istanbul and are still flying without any known issues.
The fact-checking report, shared by Ahmet Faruk Unal, a specialist at Anadolu’s Fact-Check Line, clarified that there is no link between Turkish Technic and the aircraft that crashed. The confusion was caused by misleading visuals and incorrect assumptions.
As of now, there is no confirmed evidence to suggest maintenance issues caused the crash and the investigation is still ongoing with the help of international aviation experts.
