Family Assistance Should Be Integrated into National Preparedness Plan and Guidelines

Uncertainty of the severity of the occurrence during the alerting of paramedic units led to a delay in administering first help to the passenger. In addition to this, the need for psychosocial support for the victim and other persons involved was assessed inadequately.

“When an accident involves only a single victim or a small number of victims, psychosocial support will not necessarily kick in. In Finland, we are quite well prepared for major accidents – as obliged by international regulations. In other words, if an airplane ‘augers in’ and the accident claims multiple victims, emergency response, first help and psychosocial support are immediately available. We also conduct exercises to prepare for these contingencies. However, in minor accidents, the same degree of service will not necessarily be given. International aviation regulations state that victims and their families must receive adequate assistance regardless of the magnitude of an accident,” explains investigator-in-charge Janne Kotiranta.

“The current national Joint Action Plan in the Event of Civil Aviation Accidents addresses the provision of support to accident victims and their families only as a side note, and under a misleading heading. To put it bluntly, the document, which should form the backbone for the planning of national search and rescue exercises, was last updated in 2013, just to give an example. It appears that it is only gathering dust and does not give guidelines for the provision of family assistance at a national scale,” Kotiranta adds.

The provision of information on the progress of the investigation to accident victims and their families is one of the responsibilities of the Safety Investigation Authority, Finland (SIAF).

“Family assistance is recognized by the international aviation community, and the member states are obliged to provide services that fall under this concept. A European Union regulation also requires that Finland fulfils this obligation. If Finland were subjected to an audit right now, we would not pass. But, instead of talking about passing audits and possibly ending up in the EU Court of Justice, I feel we should focus on corrective actions. To give an example, in Spain they have, after some wrangling, stood up an agency to assume responsibility for the matter,” explains SIAF Head of Public Affairs and family assistance coordinator Tiina Bieber.

“We have attended multinational workshops and meetings for a few years now, so we are not venturing into the unknown. Next year, a European Civil Aviation Conference (ECAC) working group is set to disseminate practical guidance including a template and checklist to the member states. There is, however, an additional problem: family assistance services are not the responsibility of a single stakeholder, and even more, because they are seldom stakeholders’ core activities, they are in many cases given little attention – and this is despite the high quality of social and crisis assistance in our country,” Bieber continues.

“What we need is coordination of family assistance on the national level, and coordination should cover not just aviation but all types of crises and accidents. The government communications guidelines speak about humanity, which to me is the crux of the matter. A government is for the people, and the people we serve. In Finland, preparedness has been brought to a high level – higher than in many other countries – and we should pride ourselves on that. We are living a time of instability – that is a term much used these days. While striving to prepare for events that may seriously endanger the basic functioning of the society, we must also be prepared to provide support to victims’ families and other persons involved. This is inherently linked with the functional capacity of our country. In practice, this means that all activities, that is, providing information on the location of victims, management of personal effects, recovery of remains and eventually a grieving period, form a continuous process that does not cause undue hardship to the victim and to his or her family, keeping in mind that a grieving process in itself is a challenge. An opportunity shall also be offered for spiritual recovery – and that is where assistance may be needed,” Bieber emphasizes.

The SIAF recommends that the Ministry of Transport and Communications update its Joint Action Plan in the Event of Civil Aviation Accidents, adds to the plan a description of provision of support to accident victims and their families and informs stakeholders accordingly.

​Link to summary and investigation report​

Additional information:

Investigator-in-charge Janne Kotiranta, tel. +358 29 515 0703

Head of Public Affairs Tiina Bieber, tel. +358 29 515 0714