Another crazy compo pay out, man sues family

am I missing something here?.....

He did not sue the dead mans family.

If there were no other companies involved and the pilot had operated as a sole trader, would anyone have an issue with him pursuing the claim?

I don't like the compo culture and if he wasn't injured I think a million is an outrageous sum but I do think he's entitled to sue the pilot. The fact that the pilot is dead is, to put it undiplomatically, secondary.

1 million is a very large amount. Courts have been known to award disproportionate amounts, seeing as the pilot is not around to appeal the award, is there anyone else who can?

It does seem unfair from that point, but it is stated that it was pilot error which caused the crash and that was accepted by all.

Deleted User wrote: »

genuine question,

i'm in a taxi, we crash in fog. i survive but taxi driver dies. can i sue the taxi drivers estate and the taxi company?


the fact that it's a helicopter is distorting the opinions of the incident and also the size of the payout.

Do you think that type of think has never happened?

i just had a read of the accident report

for anyone who's interested, it is very detailed and can be read here
http://www.aaiu.ie/upload/general/8253-0.PDF

here are the facts as i see them
helicopter was 100% airworthy
pilot held both irish and us licences

aaib synopsis
The helicopter was on a Visual Flight Rules (VFR) flight from New Ross, Co. Wexford,
to its base near Galway Airport. En route, it entered an area of rising terrain and low
cloud base, near Derrybrien, Co Galway. Radar tracking indicates that the helicopter
slowed down, and then made a sharp turn before disappearing off the screen. The
helicopter then suffered an in-flight collision with terrain directly after the loss of radar
contact. A passenger died at the scene and the pilot died later in hospital. Another
passenger survived with serious injuries. The probable cause was the pilot’s loss of
spatial orientation resulting from inadequate visual reference with the ground due to
limited visibility. The Report makes two Safety Recommendations.

compo mans account

The surviving front seat passenger did not initially have any recall of the accident
sequence. However with the passage of time he was able to recall some details of the
events leading to the accident. He stated that himself, the pilot and the other passenger
had gone out for the evening after their arrival in the Waterford area the day before the
accident. He and the other passenger had a few drinks but the pilot did not. They all
retired to bed between 2 and 3 AM. The following morning, as they left Waterford, the
weather was clear and the flight was uneventful. Suddenly the helicopter entered cloud.
He stated that he had not noticed any clouds in front of them and he was unsure of how
long they were in cloud before the crash. He went on to state: “We seemed to hit
something and I saw XXX (the pilot) struggling with the controls, I remember that we
went chopping through trees before coming to an abrupt halt”. At this point he became
unconscious. He later regained consciousness but was in a confused state. He recalls
asking the pilot what happened and he replied: “What do you think happened?”. He later
stated that he did not know what the pilot meant by this remark.
******************************************************************
it seems they suddenly entered cloud and the pilot probably continued following a gps course and as the ground was rising they hit trees.




helicopters are lethally dangerous and those robinsons are widely regarded as death traps
people flying in them either as passengers or crew should have their own personal insurance. its wrong that when it goes wrong, the system allows them to sue all around them
i dont think that guy should have been allowed to sue anyone in this case (other than maybe god) and certainly should not have walked away as a millionaire.

xt40 wrote: »

whose fault do you think it was thet he "nearly died"

An air accident unit found the cause of the accident to be pilot error and the case was before the court for assessment only, liability having been admitted by all defendants, he added.