Mark Wall (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I also welcome the Minister of State and thank her for her comprehensive reply. As a previous Senator said, the reply extended to 20 minutes. It will take some time to examine it, as noted by Members in the Lower House last night. There is much contained in that statement given by the Minister of State. I welcome it but we should also take some time to digest it before coming back to discuss the matter even further, given the seriousness of what is before us today.

The R116 accident of 14 March 2017 was, without doubt, an appalling tragedy. Unfortunately, it claimed the lives of four of our front-line emergency personnel, to whom we all owe a great debt of gratitude. I take the opportunity afforded to me today to extend my heartfelt sympathy to the families, loved ones and friends of the pilot, Captain Dara Fitpatrick; the co-pilot, Captain Mark Duffy; winch man Mr. Ciarán Smith; and winch operator, Mr. Paul Ormsby. It is also important to recognise and thank, as the Minister of State did, all those involved in the tremendous recovery effort in the days and weeks after the accident. It is vital we mention all those today, and as the Minister of State has said, many of them were friends of the people involved in the accident.

As noted by two of my colleagues and other Members, I sincerely hope the two families which have not received home their loved ones will eventually see them put in a resting place. I hope time will move quickly in allowing that to happen.

The report into the R116 crash in March 2017 was published earlier this month by the air accident investigation unit. As other Members said, I thank all those involved with compiling this important report for their time and efforts. The report includes detailed findings and 42 safety recommendations. I listened to statements in the Lower House last night and acknowledge the assertion from both the Minister of State today and the Minister for Transport last night that they totally accept the recommendations in the report. Of course, as indicated by a number of contributors last night, the Minister and Minister of State's acceptance of these recommendations is the right course of action. Even more important would be the announcement of the timeline for the implementation of these 42 recommendations.

I also acknowledge and will read into the record the response of the Irish Air Line Pilots' Association, given the importance of listening to those involved with the day-to-day operations of air travel in this country. I am sure the Minister of State agrees with that. IALPA is the representative body for professional pilots in Ireland, representing 1,200 pilot members. It states:

On 14 March, 2017, the crew of Rescue 116, Captain Dara Fitzpatrick, Captain Mark Duffy, Winch Operator Paul Ormsby, and Winchman Ciaran Smith lost their lives while participating in a rescue off the Mayo coast. This report shows that the loss of their lives was as needless as it was preventable. It is evident from media reporting that the final publication of the report corresponds with the AAIU interim and preliminary reports and makes it clear that the crew of R116 were exemplary in the performance of their assigned task. Their planning, response, teamwork and communication was exactly what would be expected from such a competent and seasoned crew on a flight led by such professional pilots. They were let down by a regulatory system which left them ill-equipped to do the vital work that same system tasked them with.

The report outlines a number of regulatory and systemic issues which conspired to put the crew in lethal danger. Prime amongst them was the provision of inaccurate and misleading chart and map data. All flight crew rely on the basic assumption that their maps and charts provide accurate data. Few flight crews could be more reliant on that assumption of accurate data than the crew of a rescue helicopter operating offshore in challenging conditions outside their normal home base, scrambled at short notice to launch a rescue in the middle of the night (00:45 am). They relied on the data production standards of Irish regulation to guarantee them correct information. They were let down.

IALPA President Evan Cullen described it as a fundamental betrayal: "As an airline pilot, if I take a flight from Dublin to Rome, I must navigate the Alps, and I expect one of two things from the Swiss authorities; tell me the height of the alps, or tell me they don’t know the heights, so I had better avoid them. The one thing they cannot do, under any circumstances, ever, is tell me the wrong height or tell me the Alps are not there. In essence that is what the Irish State did to Dara, Mark, Paul and Ciaran. They approved information which said, 'you are safe', when the absolute opposite was the truth."

The report details failures in oversight, equipment requirements and maintenance and in resourcing for search and rescue. But it is the regulatory failure by the now defunct Irish Aviation Authority which is central to this accident. They set the standards for equipment, for mapping and for oversight. They accepted standards which most, if not all, of their European peer authorities would not.

This tragic and unnecessary loss of life must not be allowed to happen again. IALPA is calling on the Government and Minister for Transport to institute an immediate review of the failures identified in this report and to bring forward concrete proposals to address each and every identified failure immediately.

I will take this opportunity to bring up a discussion we had in May of this year when my colleague raised the matter of the operation of SAR in Ireland. The SAR contract must again begin to include, as other Members have said, the Air Corps and Defence Forces. There must be a whole-of-government needs analysis of Ireland's air services. Along with many experts in this area, we believe that synergies can be made by incorporating a sovereign element in the forthcoming SAR contract. In the early 2000s, this country began to include a civilian provider, in addition to the Defence Forces, in providing the SAR contract. The military involvement in SAR ended in 2003. We in the Labour Party feel the time has now come to incorporate and involve the Defence Forces once again in the provision of search and rescue in this country. This would provide obvious benefits to the Defence Forces in building up its competence and assets. It would also ensure that the State is not beholden to one private operator and any unforeseen events that could result from that. The Government must recognise that the forthcoming SAR contract provides this country with an ideal opportunity to begin this process, which is long overdue.

A number of experts have come to the same initial conclusion when reading the report into this tragic accident. The loss of the lives of these brave crew members was as needless as it was preventable. For the families and their memories, an accident like this must never happen again. I urge the Minister for Transport and the Minister of State to ensure the Government puts in traceability and audits that the 42 recommendations in the final report recommend. We must also ensure that any publicly-awarded contract for search and rescue has all the necessary public and Oireachtas oversights that should be in place. Today is a day to remember but it is also a day never to forget.