Gearing to cope with disaster
Editorial
Guyana Chronicle
November 12, 2003
DEPENDING on who is saying it, last Saturday's mid-morning crash of a Trans Guyana Airways Skyvan could or could not have been avoided.
We wouldn't know for sure until local and British investigators find out why the Irish-manufactured plane crash-landed into the cane fields aback of North Ruimveldt about a minute after take-off from Ogle Aerodrome, killing two persons and injuring five others.
What we suspect is that Guyana isn't as geared as it ought to be to cope with plane accidents. If our hunch is correct, this inadequacy ought to be addressed as early as possible.
To say the least, the implications of our not having or developing the capability to grapple with airplane disasters can be devastating.
Take tourism.
Two Swedish journalists who were in Guyana on a ten-day visit left the country yesterday saying they enjoyed their stay. They had travelled to Marshall Falls and planned to go to other eco-tourism sites. But having already experienced jet trouble in Trinidad and Tobago on their way to Guyana, the two ladies (a reporter and a photographer) declined a second plane trip to the hinterland on learning of the Skyvan accident.
The Swedes had apparently concluded, upon hearing that the authorities would have to send parts of the wrecked Skyvan to Trinidad and Tobago and to the United States for examination, and that experts from the United Kingdom were coming to investigate the crash along with local personnel, that travelling to Kaieteur Falls was a chance they wouldn't be taking.
One could argue that their excuse was frivolous. Accidents happen, and this is no more strikingly evident than in Sweden and the rest of the developed world.
But this fact doesn't give us much scope for comfort.
It's not that Guyanese lack any knowledge of disaster preparedness.
The point we're seeking to make here is that although our fire service, say, has adopted an all-hazards mission statement that encompasses the many incidents to which it is expected to respond, it is more than likely that plane crash responses aren't a service specialty.
Besides, coping with plane accidents is a job for a peculiar unit trained and equipped to handle these kinds of accidents.
In many cases abroad, fire departments without primary responsibility for an airport have made few, if any, preparations for an aircraft accident. And there is also the ever popular "We've never had a plane crash here before" excuse that some are known to have made.
None of us likes to think of disaster as an integral part of our lives. But in a world where no one is perfect, and therefore where anything can happen, Guyana has to begin thinking about and gearing to cope with the unthinkable.
As unthinkable as it sounds, we must have a plan to acquire the necessary resources to respond to such a catastrophe as an aircraft accident.
Our archives remind us that eleven years ago, when United Airlines Flight 232, a DC-10, crashed in a cornfield near Sioux City, Iowa, after encountering a catastrophic failure of all of its hydraulic systems, that crash was thought impossible. It happened nonetheless.
Our own experience in Guyana is that a plane crash can occur anywhere, anytime, and without warning.
So, even though our airspace isn't crowded with passenger and cargo aircraft, Guyana's authorities must prioritize a programme to deal with accidents involving the hazards of road, air and marine traffic.