Asiana Airlines fined for not helping San Francisco crash victims’ families
Airline faces fines for failing to keep vicitims' relatives adequately informed following July 2013 crash in which three teenage girls were killed and more than 180 people injured.
US transportation officials on Tuesday fined Asiana Airlines US$500,000 for failing to promptly contact passengers’ families and keep them informed about their loved ones after a deadly crash last year at San Francisco International airport, in the first penalty of its kind.
The US Department of Transportation said it took the South Korean airline five days to contact the families of all 291 passengers, including relatives of three Chinese teenagers who died. In addition, a required crash hotline was initially redirected to an automated reservations line.
Never before has the department concluded that an airline broke US laws requiring prompt and generous assistance to the loved ones of crash victims.
Three people died and dozens were injured on July 6 when Asiana Flight 214 clipped a seawall while landing. One of the victims, a 16-year-old girl, apparently survived being ejected onto the tarmac, only to be run over by a fire truck in the post-crash confusion.
Many of the victims’ families live in South Korea or China, meaning the airline was their main source of information on the crash half a world away.
