[D Chan]

indeed the question of criminal prosecution of the Garuda captain will raise a few eyebrows especially for those who have an active involvement in aviation safety or the legal fraternity.

What Montague had said previously about Asians and pointing fingers are true to a certain extent, although I believe the notion of saving 'face' is more significant.

To what extent are the pilots responsible for this accident? Certainly by all means the aircraft as reported by the media was airworthy and visibility definitely was not in question.

Airlines, Aircraft Manufacturers, Aircraft part manufacturers have all been sued in many previous accidents. I think it is worthwhile comparing the Garuda crash with the infamous Aeroflot A310 crash over Siberia (where kids were allowed to be seated in the Captain's seat). Does the Tech Crew have the duty of care for ensuring the safety of passengers and occupants on the flight? - the answer is obviously yes - though it's a question of how much or to what extent. What if the Crew unintentionally jeopardised the safety of the flight through his / her actions - yes, they still do have the duty of care, but I would not think they would have breached it. It would be a different story however if the pilot-flying's action was deemed to be so wreckless, to the extent that it could be determined as a deliberate safety breach.

It is worth referring to the James Reason's model of safety culture:

Informed Culture– when all stakeholders have the necessary knowledge about the personal, technical and environmental components of a systematic approach to managing safety

Reporting Culture– people are encouraged and supported in reporting hazards, near misses, incidents and errors
Learning Culture – lessons learned are regularly communicated across the business so continual improvement is achieved
Risk Aware and Planning Culture – people focus on the identification of hazards prior to exposing stakeholders. Being proactive in hazard identification, control and removal, and accident and injury protection as well as health preservation and promotion is important
Just and Caring Culture – no blame is applied to those who proactively report and there is an environment of trust

We already know that safety investigations have shifted from the previous practice of apportioning blame solely on the Flight Crew for committing errors / mistakes (often they are defenseless because they don't have the chance to respond if they also died in the crash) to a more 'systemic' approach of investigating latent failures and safety deficiencies within the ‘blunt’ end of organisations (e.g. management levels).

I am sure that besides the Garuda crew on this flight, the investigation would have uncovered at least *some* deficiencies within this 'blunt end' of the airline e.g. training issues, organisation culture etc.
I do fear that the prosecution of the Flight Crew would pave the way back to the bad days of apportioning the blame solely on the crew. If that is the case I believe this would be counter-productive and that future safety investigations would not be as effective in enhancing safety across our industry.

Do note though - under Reason's Safety Culture model for 'just' culture - the element of 'no blame' does not cover those who choose to deliberately sabotage or jeopardise the safety of the flight.