Taking Care of People: Why Humanitarian Training Is Essential in Business Aviation

When tragedy strikes, an organization reveals its true character by supporting the people affected. In the days following a tragedy, families, employees and communities grapple with shock, grief and confusion. During these critical and sensitive moments, humanitarian training is not a “nice to have”—it is essential.

By training professionals to deliver emergency notifications, provide family assistance and safeguard the psychological well-being of employees, organizations will foster resilience, uphold dignity and demonstrate compassion in the face of disaster.

Is Humanitarian Training Necessary?

Guidance found within the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) emphasizes humanitarian obligations after aircraft accidents. Similarly, the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) requires family assistance programs for certain air carriers within the Aviation Disaster Family Assistance Act of 1996. Standards for assistance, procedural recommendations and lessons learned from history all provide a backdrop for humanitarian training programs. A solid humanitarian training program, which emphasizes training through exercises and role-playing, equips organizations with the tools needed to conduct these operations with professionalism and empathy.

Business aviation operators, though often smaller in scale, do not fall into the category of a regulatory-required family assistance program. These operators should still uphold the moral and reputational responsibilities of providing, wherever possible and practical, the same assistance.

What Is Humanitarian Training?

Humanitarian training in business aviation prioritizes the organization’s most important asset: people. While technical emergency response plans address aircraft recovery and regulatory requirements, an integrated humanitarian training program prepares staff to support those directly affected and their families. Humanitarian training prepares organizational members to become compassionate navigators, stepping in¹ to provide comfort, care and information for those most impacted by the accident.

Emergency Contact Notification: Notifying family members after an accident is one of the most difficult tasks to ask of an employee. Mishandled notifications can cause delayed or inaccurate information, safety concerns or sensitive news delivered without empathy. This can exacerbate existing trauma and severely erode trust. Emergency contact notification training, a critical section of the overall training program, provides structured guidance for those entrusted with this responsibility.

Notification training emphasizes delivering news to families with speed, accuracy and compassion. To effectively create trained individuals for this process, your organization should find employees who are able to step away from their normal roles, allowing them to focus solely on the people they are notifying in the aftermath of disaster.

Role play exercises are a critical component of notification training. Using them helps teams understand the necessary skills to complete a call to a loved one—potentially changing their life forever. During role play, learners can apply their newly acquired knowledge in a safe and controlled environment.

Family Assistance: Family assistance is “a set of operational practices, having intentional purpose and chronology, being administered by appropriately trained personnel, for the specific purposes of providing information, administering comfort and directing resources to the families and friends of accident victims.”² The family assistance process requires time to complete and can be divided into nine specific milestones. To meet milestone objectives, organizations establish support systems including counseling, travel and logistical coordination and close liaison with investigators and government officials.

Family assistance extends far beyond the first call, and operators establish Family Assistance Centers, offer counseling, travel support and clear channels of communication with safety investigators. Therefore, family assistance training prepares employees to transition from their normal roles to that of a compassionate navigator; effectively giving them the tools to balance professionalism with empathy and trust, ensuring that families feel cared for—not abandoned—in the aftermath of tragedy.

Summary and Conclusion

Humanitarian training is not just a procedural enhancement—it is a moral imperative defining how organizations respond to upended lives. Trained employees or service providers deliver emergency notifications with empathy, support families through structured assistance and step into the role of compassionate navigators.

In doing so, organizations demonstrate integrity, compassion, professionalism and resilience. Intentional training cultivates an employee’s core skills and with practice, readiness is assured before a tragedy. Then, if faced with tragedy, it is not only what they do that matters, but how they do it. Humanitarian training ensures delivery of professionalism, compassion and humanity to those who need it the most, when they need it most.

Resources:
¹ In the event a business aviation operator is too small to provide a full humanitarian team, the Global Aerospace SM4 Program provides guidance resources like the guidebook: “Integrating a Family Assistance Service Provider”.

² Don Chupp, President and CEO of Fireside Partners Inc.