The Air Accident Investigation Branch (AAIB) of the UK’s Department of Transport, Local Government and the Regions (DTLR) lays claim to being the world’s oldest team of aircraft crash investigators, dating its origins to 1915 as part of the Royal Flying Corps (RFC). Today, along with its U.S., French and German counterparts, AAIB commands worldwide respect in its field and now spends more than half of its time engaged in overseas accident investigations.
After its role during World War I, when the RFC was losing more pilots and aircraft to accidents than to enemy fire, the agency was charged with probing accidents in the fledgling civil air-transport industry. This followed pressure from members of the British aristocrats, who were alarmed by a spate of accidents in which several heirs to wealthy estates were killed. Early scheduled flights between London Croydon Airport and Paris Le Bourget were commonly forced to make unscheduled landings along the 230-mi route due to technical problems.
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