A new bill before the Dáil seeks to amend the “bizarre circumstances” that mean there is no legal obligation for members of the Marine Casualty Investigation Board (MCIB) to have relevant marine accident experience.
As TheJournal.ie reports, the Merchant Shipping (Investigation of Marine Casualties) Amendment Bill 2019 tabled by Mattie McGrath TD has been welcomed by relatives of two men who drowned off Helvick Head in May 2010.
The families of John O’Brien and Patrick Esmonde have taken issue with the standard of the MCIB investigation into their deaths.
The MCIB report published in February 2012, which called for better safety awareness among leisure boat users, did not conclude exactly how the pair came to enter the water. An inquest into the tragedy more than 18 months later returned an open verdict.
McGrath, who says he has “worked closely with John O’Brien’s sister Anne-Marie” on the proposed legislation, claims that the lack of a legal mandate for MCIB investigators to have relevant accident experience “has always been a major issue for the two families, who have never accepted the official outcome of the investigation into the deaths on the summer’s day”.
TheJournal.ie has much more on the story HERE.
