'Litigation,' she snarls, 'is conducted by lawyers, on behalf of
clients.' Calming, she says, 'We do not originate law suits. People
come to us. But you should know...' The lecture commences...
The central issue, she says, for everyone vested with responsibility
for public safety, is duty of care. Did the engineer (executive,
operator) do all that could have been done to avert the ...? To
prevent this line of inquiry becoming infinite (should not have got
out of bed that day), the law invokes the 'reasonable person'. What
would a reasonable person have expected the airline manager/air
controller to have done, by way of prior preparation, to render
themselves unlikely to err?
Those who practise as professionals do so under higher 'duty of care'
standards. (And many carry personal liability insurance against their
own potential for error.) Professionals in all parts of the aviation
industry need to ensure they can meet the standards of preparedness
for their duties that the reasonable person would expect of them. That
includes senior executives, everyone in the system with the ability to
affect safety outcomes.
They (we) can all check out how the reasonable person would view their
contribution, through self-assessment, 'Have I done all that I could
have done?' Don't wait until the lawyers start asking.
On the other hand, having a quiet session with a litigation lawyer
will assist focus on some of the essential issues in this area,
including the impossibility of maintaining recorded data confidential.
Just don't let them off the chain till you've fed them plenty of red
meat.
Doug