Page 16 - Index

ISASI Kapustin emotion (Campbell-Sills, Cohan, and Stein, mental well-being.
Scholarship Essay 2006). 3. Postaccident Investigation: After com-
Stress management training can facilitate pleting an accident investigation, the AAIB
investigators to self-relieve stress at work should offer continuous support to an inves-
and ensure their mental health (Rajgopal, tigator’s mental health status and provide
2010). The AAIB can strengthen investiga- timely treatment if any mental abnormalities
tors with more robust psychological qual- are found in order to ensure that their per-
ity and stress resistance, tasking them to sonal life and work life are not affected.
conduct challenging accident investigation For example, suppose an investigator is at
in remote sites. Stress management training risk of developing PTSD or is already suffer-
should be included in the training curricu- ing from PTSD. In this case, the AAIB can
lum and assessment to ensure investigators commission a psychologist to diagnose the
are equipped with sufficient knowledge and investigator using the clinician-administered
techniques on self-administered stress man- PTSD scale regularly (monthly or quarterly)
agement while facing a heavy workload. and provide psychological and pharmaco-
logical treatment to the investigator. If the
2. In the Process of Accident Investigation: The investigator is at risk of developing PTSD
AAIB should establish a compulsory coun- or has already developed it, they are treated
seling/psychophysical coherence training psychologically and medically. Conversely,
session monthly for accident investigators the mental state can be followed up for 1 to
in major accident investigations. It is a long 2 years (depending on the extent of an air
process (between 1 and 2 years normally) crash).
for a major air accident investigation. The In addition, family support is equally im-
AAIB has the responsibility to take care of portant. There is no substitute for the sense
investigators’ mental health and well-being of belonging that comes from family and
while investigators have to deal with lots friends’ support and encouragement, so the
of challenges and difficulties to find the AAIB should assist investigators with ongoing
contributing factors and write the accident communication with family members, which
investigation report. goes a long way to reducing mental stress and
As it might take 2 years from the initial maintaining mental well-being.
on-site investigation phase to the comple-
tion of the accident investigation report Conclusion
(ICAO, 2012), the AAIB should offer an effec- Although air accidents are infrequent,
tive service to ensure investigators’ mental accident investigators must be prepared to
health and well-being. Also, the Employee always go to the disaster scene. Accident
Assistance Program (EAP) has specific investigators have been trained to conduct
regulations regarding an employee’s mental professional accident investigations and
health. believe that they are more mentally capable
In the process of an accident investiga- than the general population. When faced with
tion, the AAIB should first assign a profes- harsh environments combined with physical
sional to regularly assess the investigator’s and psychological challenges, investigators
mental health using a professional mental may still suffer from stress and mental health
health assessment tool, such as the symp- issues after completing their accident investi-
tom checklist 90 (SCL-90). If an investigator gation reports.
is found to be in potential psychological Currently, there is a lack of provision on
distress, the AAIB should promptly reassign providing support to take care of investiga-
or suspend them from work and help them tors’ mental health and well-being, most of
receive mental health treatment. The regular the provisions are addressing victims’ family
psychological counseling advocated by the support. It must be recognized that the men-
EAP is equally essential (Berridge, 1990) as a tal health and well-being of accident investi-
preventive measure against mental disor- gators are of equal importance to finding the
ders (Pawłowski et al., 2018). truth and contributing factors of an accident.
The AAIB can provide safeguarding There are lots of tremendous challenges to
services to investigators through monthly accident investigators. I’d like to propose
or quarterly talks on mental well-being, solutions to strengthen investigators’ mental
psychological counseling, etc. Considering health combined with psychophysical
the impact of COVID-19, the AAIB can use resilience training. It will improve investiga-
online talks or counseling to enhance their tors’ performance on accident investigations
ability to cope with stress to ensure their and increase their well-being.
16 • October-December 2021 ISASI Forum