It seems every aviation-related publication I have read for almost a year has included an article about last September’s tragic midair in Brazil. The event certainly warrants widespread attention. However, the discussion so far has not dug deeply enough into the larger issue of what happens to the flight crew in the event of an accident, especially in a country where an accident investigation is a criminal investigation.
Long before I became an NTSB member, there was an effort under way to establish independent accident investigation organizations in countries around the world. Many countries treat any loss of life as a crime, and any investigation is conducted by the judicial system, usually headed by a judge who likely has never been involved with any aviation matters. Authorities in Britain, France, the U.S. and a few other western countries are trying to convince other nations to establish a process of independent investigations to uncover and understand the causes of any accidents occurring in their countries without a criminal investigation. This has proved a difficult task; there have been some successes, but it has been a really slow process.
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