Air India's flight AI 171, with more than 242 on board flying to London, crashed shortly after takeoff in Ahmedabad this afternoon, in one of the worst aviation disasters in aviation history.

It’s also the latest disaster to hit the beleaguered American aerospace giant — which has been dogged by a door that blew off a 737 jet, a leaky spacecraft that stranded astronauts on the International Space Station for months, as well as politically damaging delays in outfitting the new Air Force One jets.