An administrative update to a 2015 safety notice issued by the UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) has been misconstrued as a fresh safety directive in recent media reports in India, prompting the CAA to issue a clarification. The resurfaced notice, labeled SN–2015/005, addresses fuel shutoff valve concerns on multiple Boeing aircraft types, including the 737, 757, 767, 777, and 787.
The safety notice update issued on May 15, 2025, began circulating widely after it was featured by a popular Indian TV channel and amplified by several social media accounts, some of which described it as a “new” warning raising concerns about the airworthiness of Boeing aircraft – allegedly overlooked by both the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) and the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB).
The 2015 notice refers to a set of FAA Airworthiness Directives (ADs) issued at the time regarding fuel shutoff valves that could potentially fail to close in certain scenarios. The ADs required testing or replacement of affected components and were adopted globally, including by EASA. ADs are mandatory and operators addressed these requirements nearly a decade ago.
UK CAA Clarifies
However, the UK CAA has since clarified that the notice was originally issued in 2015 and the only update made on 15 May 2025 was to change an email address—an administrative adjustment unrelated to technical safety concerns.
“This Safety Notice was originally issued in 2015. It was updated on 15 May 2025 on our website, to reflect a change to the email address in the document,” the CAA stated via its official X account.
The 2025 notice updates the email address, asking for any queries or requests for further guidance as a result of this communication to be addressed to [email protected] instead of the email ID mentioned in the 2015 notice.
A side-by-side comparison of the two notices can be seen below:
The recent wave of reporting, however, treated the re-uploaded document as a newly issued safety alert, sparking confusion and unwarranted concern. This incident highlights the risk in reporting technical aviation documents without adequate verification or context, particularly when such documents are part of standard regulatory practice.
The attention on the document appears to stem from widespread discontent among Indian aviation commentators and sections of the media with the recent AAIB preliminary report on the Air India AI171 crash. In this case, however, the UK CAA’s update is purely administrative and unrelated to any new findings. The mandatory FAA Airworthiness Directives (ADs) referenced in the notice were issued in 2015 and would have been addressed by all operators nearly a decade ago.
Read: “Why Did You Cutoff?” – A Timeline of Horror in the Air India AI171 Crash
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