Forum Non Conveniens In International Air Accident Lawsuit

In both the frequency of occurrence and the death toll of large aviation disasters,2014 ranks the highest during the last ten years. From the crash of a flight in Romania on January 20th, just like dominoes being knocked down, here comes a series of aviation accidents, such as the crash of 183 flight of Nepal Airlines on February 16th, the event of disappeared MH370 of Malaysia Airlines on March 8th,the crash of Columbia Ambulance Airplane on March 12th, the crash of MH17 of Malaysia Airlines caused by being shot down on July 17th, a serious fall of an airplane of Taiwan Trans-Asia Airways on July 23th, the crash of an airplane of Air Algerie on July 24th, and the crash of an missed airplane of Air Asia on December 28th. After the occurrence of accidents, there will be lots of lawsuits about compensation causing our attentions. Facing these cases, we should solve the problem of jurisdiction at first. The doctrine of forum non conveniens, as a difficult problem about jurisdiction, needs to be handled as well. Since the usage of the doctrine of forum non conveniens is not unified in practice, it is possible to cause negative conflicts of jurisdiction. For example, in the lawsuit of Western Caribbean Crash, after being dismissed by American courts, the lawsuit was dismissed as well by The Supreme Court of France, when plaintiff brought it again in a French court. Then, the initial American court refused the case again when plaintiffs want a another try there. Two involved countries have tried to shift their responsibilities onto each other, resulting in victims or their relatives almost losing their reliefs. Only when the problem of doctrine of forum non conveniens is resolved, can the two parties make relatively reliable prediction for the likely outcome of the case, and choose the court from which one can most likely get his or her relief according to the this prediction. Or to design the application standards of forum non conveniens which can be accepted by most countries, after approving the qualification of application, which can reduce the occurrence of what has been talked about before.Therefore, this article analyses and studies the practice, relative cases and theories of forum non conveniens in international aviation litigations, from the perspective of unified international aviation conventions (mainly "Warsaw Convention" and "Montreal Convention"), following the development of practice, giving a clear opinion about the position to the doctrine of forum non conveniens from the perspective of aviation-related conventions. Meanwhile, to put forward some feasible suggestions of putting the doctrine of forum non conveniens into our aviation law system.In chapter 1, this article introduces the concept of lawsuit of international aviation accident and the concept of doctrine of forum non conveniens to clarify the range of what we analysis, and introduces the practice and the dominant international convention of the doctrine of forum non conveniens in the field of litigation about aviation accident. In chapter 2, the writer analyzes and judges whether the doctrine of forum non conveniens can be applied in the field of litigation about aviation accident, concluding the regular patterns about its usage in practice, analyzing the attitudes to it involved in conventions, and introducing as well as analyzing the options which have been made by different countries to confirm that the doctrine of forum non conveniens should be applied in the conventions. In chapter 3, the article explores the related problems resulting from the application of the doctrine of forum non conveniens in the field of litigation about aviation accident, putting forward advice to include the doctrine of forum non conveniens in conventions involved in the area of international air transportation.In chapter 4, based on the national conditions of our country, the writer introduces litigation about air accidents involving our county, which have applied or may apply the doctrine of forum non conveniens, analyses the influence of forum non conveniens to the direction of cases’ destiny, introduces the attitude taken by our country to that doctrine and our experiences in legislation and practice in recent years, gets the conclusion of putting the doctrine of forum non conveniens into our aviation law system, and makes advice about the measures and pre-conditions of its usage.