Review into R116 crash report ongoing one year after it started

A member of the Irish Coast Guard looks out towards a misty Achill as the search continues for Rescue 116 along Blacksod coastline, Co Mayo, in 2017. Photo: Steve Humphreys Catherine Fegan

September 22 2021 02:30 AM

A review into a report on the Rescue 116 helicopter crash is still continuing, more than a year after the process was formally announced. Four Irish Coast Guard crew members died when the helicopter crashed into Blackrock Island, off the north Mayo coast in 2017.

After an extensive and lengthy inquiry, the Air Accident Investigation Unit’s (AAIU) draft final report was issued to interested parties in September 2019. In March last year, a review board was established to examine certain findings following a request from one of the parties subject to the investigation.The process results from a claim by the party in question that the findings reflected adversely on their reputation.It is the first time that a review has been carried out into an AAIU inquiry.

The Review Board, chaired by Senior Counsel Patrick McCann, has been established in line with Regulation 16 of Air Navigation Regulations 2009. The regulations provide that on completion of the re-examination, the Chairperson of the Review Board makes a report to the Minister for Transport. It is understood that the Minister has not received the report from Mr McCann to date. Last October it emerged that a key member of the team reviewing the report resigned due to a conflict of interest. The resignation of Phillip Hanson, a senior manager at the UK Coastguard, and the technical expert on the two-man review team, came after Mr Hanson disclosed that he had a personal connection with a senior manager at the helicopter operator, CHC. That manager was due to give evidence on behalf of CHC to the review board.

This week, a spokesperson for the Department of Transport said the review was entirely independent and that it was a matter for the chairman to determine how the process would be carried out and how long it would take to complete. The bodies of Captain Dara Fitzpatrick and Captain Mark Duffy were recovered in the days following the tragedy. The remains of their colleagues, winch operator Paul Ormsby and winch man Ciarán Smith, remain lost at sea. Their helicopter had been dispatched to provide assistance to another helicopter, Rescue 118, that was retrieving an injured fisherman from a trawler in the Atlantic.The inquest into the deaths of the crew cannot be finalised until the AAIU report is published

The law governing air accident investigations allows any person or organisation to seek a re-examination of “any findings and conclusions” that appear to “reflect adversely” on their reputation. However, this is the first time for an AAIU report to be referred to a review board in the AAIU’s 25-year history, during which it has carried out nearly 1,000 investigations. AAIU inquiries are protected by highly restrictive legislation that makes it a criminal offence to reveal details prior to official publication of an air accident investigation report.

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