[Peetwo]

The article – HERE – published on Paper- Li highlights some of the complexities surrounding the MH 370 search; not only from the accident investigator v judiciary perspective, but creeps into the murky realms of politics played in the rarefied atmosphere of international diplomacy, credibility and public perception.  

It must be bad enough for anyone to loose a loved one in an air accident, of any kind but given the ‘mystery’, speculation, doubt and confused information, both official and media based, it must be a daily misery to those who wait for news.

Best we can do is hope for some sanity, probity and most of all hard evidence.   Spare a thought today for those who wait..

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Top catch "K"..  Due (IMO) it's significance in the search for aviation accident investigative probity, both internationally but especially here in Oz with the present status quo of the ATSB, here it is in full: 

MH370 debris exposes divisions over air crash investigations

By drifting on to Reunion Island, the barnacled remains of a Boeing wing part from the Malaysia Airlines jet have given the upper hand to a French judicial investigation, exposing for the second time this year how civil crash investigations struggle to compete with police-led probes.  


A woman whose relative was aboard Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 holds a placard after police stopped protesting relatives from entering a road leading to the Malaysian embassy in Beijing on Aug 7, 2015. (Photo: REUTERS/Damir Sagolj)


PARIS: Air crash investigators risk being sidelined in a tussle to unlock the secrets of lost flight MH370, fuelling concerns that their role in making flying safer could be diminished.
By drifting on to Reunion Island, the barnacled remains of a Boeing wing part from the Malaysia Airlines jet have given the upper hand to a French judicial investigation, exposing for the second time this year how civil crash investigations struggle to compete with police-led probes. 

For decades, reconstructions of disasters by specialist safety investigators have been seen as crucial to making aviation safer, with accident rates at historically low levels. 

But in dozens of countries, notably France, they exist in uneasy co-habitation with separate criminal inquiries. Simmering tensions over the sharing of evidence between civil and judicial investigators came into the open after the crash of a Germanwings jet into the French Alps in March.

They are under scrutiny again after Indian Ocean currents deposited the "flaperon" from the missing Malaysia Airlines flight into the hands of judges investigating the suspected manslaughter of four French citizens out of 239 people on board.

How France handles both cases could have a wider impact given its influence over aviation safety worldwide and the similarity between its civil-law system and most other jurisdictions.

Its BEA safety investigation board is regularly called in to look at incidents because France is home to Airbus, which makes up 42 percent of the world jetliner fleet.
"Criminal investigation should not compromise the important role that air accident investigation plays in keeping flying safe," said Kevin Hiatt, safety chief at the International Air Transport Association, the trade association for airlines.

Supporters of the French system of parallel investigations say it prevents cover-ups, supports families and benefits from stronger powers of discovery.

Concerns about judicial interference may cut little ice with MH370 families who have been frustrated at the apparent lack of results from the civil investigation into the disappearance of the Kuala Lumpur to Beijing flight.

"This kind of closed, unjust, and totally inefficient investigation is really hard for me to understand," said Jiang Hui, a Chinese man whose mother was aboard Flight MH370.

NO BLAME APPORTIONED
Civil crash investigators follow United Nations guidelines from the International Civil Aviation Organization. Their sole aim is to help prevent future accidents by finding out causes.

"The idea has never been to establish who is the bad guy, for the simple reason that it does no good when it comes to improving safety," said Paul-Louis Arslanian, former director of France’s BEA air safety investigation agency. "It is better to understand why errors were committed and what prevented this being identified."

It is a rare example of an industry being granted a global remit to ensure its safe development. But the 70-year-old system must reckon with modern demands for stricter corporate liability and the social media storm generated by every crash.

Add to this the fact that human factors have become a priority as technology reduces mechanical vulnerabilities, and experts say the pressure to cast blame is greater than ever.

While families wait for clues about the missing jet, 17 months after MH370 mysteriously vanished, the flaperon risks being submerged once again by jurisdictional in-fighting.

It was recovered by the gendarmerie on the French island, a military force accountable to French judges leading the criminal probe and not to the BEA or its Malaysian counterparts.

Relations between the gendarmerie and BEA have been prickly for years and hit a new low hours after the Germanwings crash that killed 150 people.

In an unprecedented move, the BEA's current director was summoned to police offices to face questions about the speed at which it had shared just-deciphered cockpit recordings, according to several people familiar with the incident.

JUDICIAL CONTROL
Those tensions are fresh in the minds of those now handling the MH370 investigation. While prosecutors have pledged to share their findings in due course, a judicial source stressed the flaperon would remain under judicial control.

Experts from several international agencies were allowed to witness its inspection but only after a delay of several days and under a judge's supervision, and not on BEA premises.

"However you paint it, it gives the impression that the BEA and other investigators are working for the judiciary," said another former air crash investigator. "It is a power struggle and in the long term it may be damaging for credibility of crash investigators generally."

Malaysia played down any conflict between the judicial probe and its own civil investigation, of which the BEA is part. "They will go hand in hand. There's no clear distinction between their report and our report. Whatever they find they will add onto our investigation later," Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai told Reuters.

But experts say it is a further setback for the Southeast Asian nation which struggled to establish an independent investigation in the face of criticism, only to see the first physical piece of evidence fall into the possession of French judges who have been asserting primacy over air accidents.

That may in turn heap pressure on a landmark EU law designed to preserve a "balance" between judicial and civil probes.

"I get worried when I see that we are not advancing as quickly as we should, that we are going backwards or trampling on the confidence that should exist between different parties," said Arslanian, one of the architects of the 2010 regulation. "For now the trust between national and international partners is there, but you have to keep building it every day."

The debate about the blurring of judicial and civil roles could complicate efforts to improve safety by openly discussing problems in everyday operations.

"A lot of aviation professionals are fearful that by being frank to technical investigators they could end up in court," said Andreas Matteou, an Airbus A320 training captain. "The risk is that they will just fly on autopilot and share as little as possible."

The parallels are remarkable with the ATSB v CASA and their sharing/dissemination of mandatory/confidential incident reports. Especially under a big "R" regulator where the ridiculous, voluminous regs are written with strict liability penalties attached.

This was regarded by the Forsyth review panel as so much of a significant safety issue - & as outlined in the guiding 'Just Culture' principles of ICAO Annex 19 - that they issued recommendations to the Minister to urgently address.

Subsequently the Minister issued an expectation - in his 'Statement of Expectations' to CASA & ATSB - that was to address this safety issue.
Example expectation 8 from  CASA SOE:

8.        work closely with the ATSB to ensure continued arrangements are in place, consistent with the current Safety Information Policy Statement and informed by ‘just culture’ principles, for the appropriate sharing and use of safety information by CASA and the ATSB;

But I diverge..

Also hot off the MH370 news front, there was this courtesy of Jeff Wise (sorry "K".. )

French Report: Investigators Can’t Link Reunion Flaperon to MH370

– August 21, 2015Posted in: Aviation

I am grateful to reader @AM2, who early this morning alerted us to a report in the French website LaDepeche.fr stating that investigors who have been examining the flaperon found on Reunion have been unable to find any evidence linking it to MH370. Soon after, reader @Jay provided the translation below, which I’ve tweaked and edited using my high-school French and some online dictionaries. Thanks to both of you (and to Brock for his translation help)! Any corrections or suggestions from people who actually know the language would be very gratefully received.

MH370: At Balma, the Technical Investigation is Complete 
The Toulouse experts of the Directorate General of Armaments have finished the survey of the flaperon found on Reunion. Nothing permits it to be 100% certified as belonging to MH370!

In Balma, near Toulouse, technical analysis of of the wing flaperon believed to belong to the Malaysia Airlines Boeing has ended. The Toulouse engineers have submitted their findings to the Paris Prosecutor’s Office, which is in charge of the judicial inquiry. At the moment none of their observations have been leaked. “The investigation team headed by the French to consider the flaperon concluded the first phase of its inspection work,” the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) announced in Sydney.

Circumstantial evidence
“French authorities will, in consultation with Malaysia, report on progress in due course,” added the ATSB. Indeed, the judicial authorities remain silent and refuse to comment. According to our information, the experts have found no compelling technical element that would certify 100% that this piece belongs to flight MH370. “The expert conclusions are only the technical part of the criminal investigation, which is still going on,” so the case cannot be considered closed. For now all that is certain is that the flaperon, which was transferred from the island of Reunion to Toulouse on August 5, corresponds to a moving part of a wing of the Boeing 777. A representative of the American manufacturer Boeing quickly confirmed that after arriving at the site of the DGA Aeronautical Technical Center in Balma. If the deputy prosecutor of the Republic of Paris has stated that there was a “very strong supposition” that the piece belonged to the plane of flight MH370, which disappeared 18 months ago, that is based on circumstantial evidence.

First, the piece belongs to the aircraft model corresponding to that of Malaysia Airlines, a Boeing 777. In addition, no other aircraft of this type except that of the Malaysian company were reported missing.

Also, the trajectory of the wing piece that ran aground on a beach in Reunion matches the sea currents that link the search area of the wreckage of the plane to the French overseas department. Finally, the shells found attached to the flaperon belong to a species endemic to the southern Indian Ocean where the unit is believed to have disappeared.

According to a Toulouse aeronautics expert who requested anonymity, the element of the wing would not have floated for several months at the water’s surface but would have drifted underwater a few meters deep. According to Jean-Paul Troadec, former chairman of the Bureau of Investigation and Analysis (BEA), the state of flaperon, even if it is not intact, indicates that there was no violent impact with the ocean surface. “If this had been the case with the MH370, one would expect much smaller debris than a flaperon,” said the expert.

COMMENT

A couple of observations from me, JW:

1. I find it odd that a piece of random debris would happen to have exactly neutral buoyancy, as floating for months just below the ocean surface would require. Unless it was tethered…
   
2. Reader @Jay raises the question: “What about the maintenance seal that Malaysia claimed 100% linked the part to MH370?” Likewise, no mention is made of the discrepencies that Boeing and NTSB officials reportedly found between the flaperon and Malaysia Airlines maintenance records, according to the New York Times.  Hopefully the French will soon issue a report clearing up these issues.
   

 
Hmm...fascinating, is the Malaysian Government MH370 charade about to unravel - time will tell..

MTF..P2

Ps Sorry Aussie came over the top of you - good post by the way..