Indian chief of defense pilot “weather disoriented”: consultation | Weather News

The government blamed the unexpected weather on the crash of a helicopter that killed the head of the Indian armed forces last month.

A pilot disoriented by a sudden change in weather conditions crashed a helicopter carrying Indian Chief of Defense General Bipin Rawat last month. All 14 people die on the ship, they found an official investigation.

Rawat, 63, was traveling with his wife and other senior officers on a Russian Mi-17V5 helicopter that crashed near the destination in the southern state of Tamil Nadu on December 8th.

“The court of instruction has ruled out mechanical failure, sabotage or negligence as the cause of the accident,” the Indian Defense Ministry said on Friday.

The ministry said the investigation team questioned the flight data recorder, cabin voice recorder and witnesses for its preliminary report.

“The accident was caused by clouds entering the valley due to an unexpected change in the weather conditions in the valley,” the statement said. “This caused the pilot’s spatial disorientation to be a controlled ground flight.”

A day after the accident, the Indian Defense Minister said the helicopter lost contact he was due to land with air traffic control seven minutes earlier and did not send a suspense call until he was found on fire in a wooded area.

Rawat was India’s first defense chief of staff, a post set by the government in 2019, and was seen close to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

His death was echoed in the Indian media on a wall-to-wall basis, and a coffin wrapped in a flag was towed through the streets of New Delhi in a flower cart covered with garlands of flowers before being cremated.

He and his wife were cremated together in the same pyre, and their daughters fired 17 pistols at the fire.

Officer Rawat was obvious and polarized, but very well known, he came from a military family and was already surviving a helicopter crash in 2015 with minor injuries.

He went to the General Defense Service Staff College to address students and faculty when the Mi-17 helicopter crashed into the fog.