Dialogue heard on a cockpit voice recording in the Air India flight that crashed in June, killing 260 people, is fueling speculation about what happened in the seconds after the aircraft took off and crashed.

The cockpit voice recorder from last month’s Boeing 787 Dreamliner crash has revealed a crucial exchange between the flight’s two pilots.

According to The Wall Street Journal, a preliminary report released last week included details that the captain may have turned off the fuel just after takeoff, prompting the first officer to panic.

According to that preliminary report, the plane’s fuel cutoff switches for both engines went from the “RUN” position to the “CUTOFF” position shortly after takeoff. Both happened within one second, shutting off fuel to both engines.

In the cockpit voice recording, one of the pilots is heard asking the other why he hit the cutoff switch.

“The other pilot responded that he did not do so,” that report stated.

Captain Sumeet Sabharwal, an experienced pilot with more than 8,200 hours in the cockpit, was piloting the Air India Boeing 787 Dreamliner when the plane went down.

First Officer Clive Kunder expressed “surprise” and then “panicked” as he asked the captain why he’d moved the fuel switches.

On the other hand, the captain appeared to remain calm, but he denied doing so.

242 people were onboard when the aircraft plummeted to the ground and smashed into a doctors’ accommodation building at the Byramjee Jeejeebhoy Medical College and Civil Hospital.

India’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau has since highlighted how ‘certain sections of the international media are repeatedly attempting to draw conclusions through selective and unverified reporting’, which it deems ‘irresponsible’ as the investigation continues.

One anonymous air accident investigator from Canada believes that if one of the pilots’ operated the switches unwittingly or unconsciously’, then it’s ‘understandable that they would later deny having done it.’

He added: “But if [the second pilot] operated the switches deliberately and with intent, he may have posed the question knowing full well that the cockpit voice recorder would be scrutinised, and with the aim of deflecting attention and avoiding identification as the one responsible.

“Even if the AAIB is eventually able to determine who said what, that doesn’t decisively answer the question ‘Who turned the fuel off?’ We may even never know the answer to that question.”

One Person Survived the Air India Crash

An Air India aircraft departs Toronto Pearson International Airport for the United Arab Emirates in Mississauga, Ontario, on June 25, 2025. (Photo by Mike Campbell/NurPhoto via Getty Images

Vishwash Kumar Ramesh was the only survivor of the Air India plane crash.

Ramesh, who was sitting in seat 11A, suffered only cuts to his face and some chest injuries.

Kumar Ramesh is dealing not just with the unimaginable events but also the loss of his younger brother, Ajay, who was on the plane