The family of a man who died in an air crash in New Zealand have been told that the country´s law does not allow them to make a compensation claim for a death in an airplane accident.
Patrick Byrne (26) from County Wexford was killed when the Fletcher FU24 airplane he was travelling in crashed shortly after take-off on September 4th 2010. Patrick was killed along with three other tourists, the plane´s pilot and four sky-dive instructors in the accident at the Fox Glacier Airstrip in Westland.
The cause of the crash was never identified after two independent investigations resulted in contradictory theories due to much of the plane being destroyed by the fire which started as the plane crashed.
The coroner at the inquest into the nine deaths concluded that the cause of the accident may never be known, but suggested that it could have been caused by the plane being unbalanced due to unrestrained passengers moving about in the back of the airplane.
Families of the victims have written to New Zealand´s Prime Minister – John Key – asking that stronger safety enforcement is introduced as, at the minute, there is no legislation in New Zealand that airplane passengers should wear seatbelts during take-off.
The families have also called on the Prime Minister to address the country´s laws which do not allow them to make a compensation claim for a death in an airplane accident. New Zealand law does not allow companies to be taken to court for negligence and compensation is decided by the New Zealand Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC) – a department of the Government responsible for compensating personal injuries to residents and visitors to New Zealand.
The compensation for a death in an airplane accident awarded to the families of the victims by the ACC amounted to approximately €3,200 – not even enough to repatriate the bodies of the airplane disaster victims home to their loved ones.