Investigations into accidents and incidents in civil aviation

Parliament approved the proposal for a directive with 11 amendments. The proposed amendments sought: - to establish the closest possible coordination between the technical investigation and the judicial inquiry; - to extend the scope of the directive to cover not only serious accidents but all types of incident; - to include cases involving accidents in which there were casualties requiring a period of hospitalization longer than 24 hours, instead of the 48 hours required by the Directive; - to state that the inquiry should be held, and free assistance provided, without the intervention of external agencies; - to set a maximum time-limit of 12 months, from the date of the accident, for the investigating agency to publish a report; - to require Member States to take the necessary measures to ensure that the said report was published; - to state that only information of a purely material nature, which has been obtained during the inquiry, may be used for the purpose of any other inquiry or action which is undertaken following the accident or incident in question; - to set 30 June 1995 as the final date for the Commission to present to Parliament and the Council proposals relating to: . the adoption of mandatory procedures for the presentation of reports, . the setting up of a confidential system for the voluntary presentation of reports, . the payment of compensation to victims of air accidents, - to set 31 December 1995 as the final date for the Council to give a ruling on the proposals presented by the Commission; - to guarantee access to the site of the accident or incident, as well as to the airplane, its wreckage and cargo, including luggage. �