Repairs under way on UK fighter jet stuck in India for three weeks

BBC:

A 14-member team of engineers from the UKis carrying out repairs on a state-of-the-art British fighter jet that has been stuck at an airport in India for more than three weeks.

The F-35B landed on 14 June at Thiruvananthapuram airport in the southern state of Kerala where it was diverted after it ran into bad weather during a sortie in the Indian Ocean.

The plane then reported a technical snag and was unable to return to the HMS Prince of Wales, the Royal Navy’s flagship carrier.

Its prolonged presence on Indian soil has sparked curiosity and raised questions about how such a modern aircraft could remain stranded in a foreign country for so long.

Since the jet’s landing, engineers from HMS Prince of Wales had assessed the aircraft, but they were unable to fix it.

On Sunday, the British High Commission said in a statement that a team of engineers from UK was “deployed to Thiruvananthapuram airport to assess and repair the F-35B aircraft”.

It said the team was “carrying specialist equipment necessary for the movement and repair process”.