Expert research of air incidents and incidents in forensic practice

Abstract

The article is devoted to the problems of one of the types of forensic engineering expertise, namely the aircraft engineering expertise. In the light of the growing number of aircraft operating in the airspace of Ukraine, the increasing intensity of air traffic, as well as the specifics of the Ukrainian air fleet, the relevance of forensic aviation technical expertise is getting extremely high.

At present, there is virtually no relevant expert specialization and all studies are conducted by forensic experts who have the relevant aviation technical education with the involvement of experts as forensic experts in the field of flight operation, repair and maintenance of aircraft, meteorologists, airfield support, ground support of flights, etc.

Summarizing the expert practice of conducting forensic examinations on aviation incidents, the authors of the article point out the urgent need to create an appropriate expert specialty, which in turn involves making changes to the regulatory documents that govern the procedure for appointment and conducting forensic examinations. To provide an adequate level of justification, the necessity of creating an appropriate expert specialty, the authors briefly describe the subject and objects of the aviation technical expertise, as well as provide an indicative list of issues to be addressed by this expertise that are solved by this expert examination.

Regarding the methodological support for the implementation of aviation technical expertise, the authors proposed, in their opinion, the most rational method of ensuring proper examination is the creation on the basis of the regulatory procedure for investigating aviation incidents by regulatory documents of ICAO, taking into account the national procedural legislation of Ukraine. The established methodology in its essence should be a universal document describing the main stages of the expert research – it should be step by step instructions. In future, in addition to the established methodology of aviation technical expertise, narrowly focused methodical recommendations can be added that detail the procedure of examination of certain types of aircraft or their systems and assemblies.