TransAsia Airways Corp (復興航空) yesterday said it has no plans to increase compensation to families of people killed in an airplane crash in Taipei in February, despite a preliminary report by the Aviation Safety Council suggesting that it was caused by human error.
“It is a preliminary investigative report. The main cause of the accident is yet to be determined until a final report [is issued],” TransAsia chief executive Peter Chen (陳欣德) told a press conference after the council released the report.
The airline has offered NT$14.9 million (US$478,330) to each family of the people killed on Flight GE235, which crashed into the Keelung River in Nangang District (南港) on Feb. 4. The size of the compensation is the same as TransAsia’s offer to the families of another airplane crash — Flight GE222 — in Penghu in July last year.
Photo: Fang Pin-chao, Taipei Times
Among the 43 people killed in the Nangang crash, seven families of the 28 Chinese victims of the accident have signed settlement agreements with the airline, while another 16 have given their verbal consent, Chen said.
TransAsia said it would continue to communicate with the families of Taiwanese and Chinese who have not yet reached an agreement with the carrier.
“We respect their decision. We will work harder to communicate with them,” Chen said, adding that none of the families from the Penghu and Nangang incidents have pressed charges against the company.
TransAsia has also reached agreements with 36 families, or 80 percent, of the 45 people killed in the Penghu incident, Chen said.
The company has carried out several measures to enhance aviation safety under the guidance of the Civil Aeronautics Administration, including setting up two flight crew training centers and buying simulators, he said.
TransAsia president Fred Wu (吳滬生) said the company boosted its staff by 20 percent to improve efficiency and aviation control.
He said that the carrier increased salaries by between 4 and 6 percent in March and would launch a promotion program later this month as part of its efforts to retain employees.
Chen declined to disclose total expenditure for the two new training centers, simulators and increased personnel costs.
TransAsia reported a net loss of NT$61.14 million in the first quarter. That compares with a net income of NT$49.61 million in the same period last year.
Sales for April and May totaled NT$1.59 billion, down 30.9 percent from last year’s NT$2.3 billion, it said in a filing to the Taiwan Stock Exchange.
Commenting on the business outlook for this summer — the peak season for travel — Chen said that bookings for Japan were not as good as last year.
“We will have to work really hard to improve our business this and next quarter,” Chen said.
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