Safety bureau admits delays

[Guest Chainsaw]

Steve Creedy

October 13, 2006

 

AIR crash investigators took significantly longer to report their findings in 2005-06, and more delays are expected this financial year.

 

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau's annual report reveals that the median time taken to release an accident report rose to 379 days in 2004-05, up almost 50 per cent on the 247 days recorded the previous year.

 

This exceeded the bureau's target of 365 days as it struggled to provide resources for the complicated Lockhart River investigation, develop a new information management system and train new investigators.

 

The report said the Lockhart River crash and additional training for the new information management system would continue to place demands on resources this financial year "after which improvements in timeliness are expected".

 

The findings come as Lockhart River families have been complaining about the length of time it has taken to investigate Australia's worst air disaster in almost four decades.

 

The bureau has released a number of safety recommendations in the wake of the Lockhart River crash but does not expect to publicly release a final report until March.

 

Investigators last month stressed the complexity of the report and said they were still examining issues relating to aircraft operator Transair's management, procedures, training and documentation as well as regulatory oversight of the airline.

 

But relatives of the victims are still frustrated investigators are no closer to finding the cause of the fatal crash and have called for a full Senate inquiry into the circumstances surrounding the disaster.

 

The bureau's annual report indicates Lockhart River is not the only probe to breach its target for completing investigations.

 

While the number of investigations not completed dropped slightly from 86 at the end of 2004-05 to 81 by June 30, the number that were more than a year old rose from 14 to 18.

 

This was despite a drop in the number of accidents from 158 in 2004-05 to 122 last financial year and a fall in the number of serious incidents from 27 to 24.

 

Other findings included a big jump in the number of reportable aviation incidents, from 5961 in 2004-05 to 7471 last year.

 

The sudden jump also represented an increase of 18 per cent on the previous peak of 6102 reportable incidents in 2000-01.

 

However, investigators said increases were likely to be the result of greater industry awareness of reporting requirements, rather than a sudden jump in the number of incidents.

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/st ... 49,00.html