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Airlines PNG Kokoda: Port Moresby – Kokoda (PNG) 11 August 2009
Passengers’ families have valuable compensation rights. Because the flight was a commercial operation conducted by a commercial operator, air carriage law applies.
Recoverable losses include financial/dependency losses for children, spouses (including de-facto spouses) and others who are or were likely to be financially dependent now or in the future, on the income of the deceased.
The extent of dependency will be different for infant children on the one hand as compared to spouses and adult children. The period of dependency will also be different depending on the age of the deceased and the age of the claimant.
Under air carriage law, airline liability is capped. If passengers were PNG domestic ticketed the maximum available compensation is quite low - approx $66,000 per passenger injury/death. If the flight was booked and ticketed in Australia as part of an international itinerary, then Australia's international carriage compensation regime will apply. Australia’s international carriage compensation regime was updated on 24/01/2009 so that the Montréal convention 1999 now applies.
Please Make an online enquiry » or call Peter Carter or Joseph Wheeler on 1300 LAW LAW (1300 529 529) to discuss.
For commentary as to Australia's international passenger compensation regime (and the prevailing Australian domestic regime) see: http://www.cartercapner.com.au/resources/mediacentre/
mediareleases/2009/mr-240609-Qwsuntupc.htm
Liability theory: Not currently available. "Situational awareness" likely to be a factor.
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Lockhart River Accident: Bamaga - Lockhart River (Qld) 7 May 2005
Passengers’ families have valuable compensation rights. Because the flight was a Regular Public Transport operation conducted by an operator with an Air Operators Certificate and being conducted wholly within Queensland, air carriage law applies.
Recoverable losses include financial/dependency losses for children, spouses (including de-facto spouses) and others financially dependent now or in the future, on the income of the deceased.
The extent of dependency will be different for infant children on the one hand as compared to spouses and adult children. The period of dependency will also be different depending on the age of the deceased and the age of the claimant.
Please Make an online enquiry » or call Peter Carter or Joseph Wheeler on 1300 LAW LAW (1300 529 529) to discuss.
Claims will proceed according to the following liability theory:
The accident was investigated by the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) and the Queensland Coroner. They found that the aircraft slammed into a mountain peak on descent to land in the Iron Range peaks while conducting a published GPS instrument approach in Instrument Flight Conditions (IMC) under Instrument Flight Rules (IFR).
It was flying too low in that part of the landing because of pilot error called "situational awareness".
"Situational Awareness" errors are common in IMC (cloud) and in GPS approaches because of high cockpit workload, inconsistent approach design and poor charting of the descent path. These factors - all recognised by the ATSB - combine to create a situation where the pilot believes they are further along the approach than is the case and therefore descend below the safe level for that part of the landing.
Pilots are trained to avoid this confusion but accidents or incidents commonly follow if it does.
Carter Capner Law has established an online petition http://www.cartercapner.com.au/resources/advocacy/transport.asp to demand the Transport & Infrastructure minister Anthony Albanese to urgently commit to an early introduction of Ground Based Regional Augmentation Systems (GRAS) that will provide passengers in rural and remote Australian communities with the same level of air safety as passengers travelling in and out of capital city airports.
Read Carter Capner Law’s 2007 media statement concerning this issue http://www.cartercapner.com.au/resources/
mediacentre/mediareleases/2007/mr030907-LachGPSlaf.htm
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