After the crazy turbulence on the Singapore Airlines flight, many passengers are looking to sue for their injuries and trauma. But handling a major aviation disaster case like this isn’t something you want to trust just any regular attorney with. Nope, you’ll need to bring in special lawyers who are true experts on aviation accident cases – because the laws and strategies involved are a whole different ballgame.
These Aren’t Normal Injury Cases
On the surface, plane turbulence injuries might seem like typical personal injury claims over things like car accidents. You get hurt, so you sue for damages, basic stuff right? Well, when it comes to aviation incidents, especially those spanning multiple countries, it’s way more complicated than that.
International Laws Apply
The very first major issue is that normal state or national laws often don’t apply to aircraft accidents. Instead, there are special international rules and treaties that take over for flights between different countries. And these laws have their own unique definitions and requirements for everything:
- What officially counts as an “accident” worthy of compensation
- How much money airlines are liable for per passenger
- What types of injuries qualify for damages payouts
- Procedures for actually filing and litigating these claims properly
So if you try using a regular lawyer unfamiliar with aviation conventions like the Montreal Treaty, you could bungle your entire case from the start. Hiring attorneys who really understand these systems inside-and-out is crucial.
Technical Evidence is Key
Personal injury cases like slip-and-falls usually just rely on things like medical records or eyewitness testimony as key evidence. But for aviation disasters, the whole case often hinges on very technical data that requires special expertise to obtain and present:
- Cockpit voice recordings and flight data
- Air traffic control recordings
- Analysis of weather patterns
- Maintenance logs and plane history
- Crew training certifications
You need lawyers who know how to subpoena and analyze all these complex records. They also have to hire specialized experts to properly interpret things like meteorological conditions and FAA regulations. It’s a ton of technical groundwork that could make or break an entire case.
Even Filing a Claim is Tricky
Simply providing the airline with a proper initial legal notice of your intent to make a claim has a very particular process under international aviation laws. If the strictest formatting and procedures aren’t followed exactly, your whole case could get tossed before it starts.
Aviation lawyers deal with these notice requirements daily, while a regular attorney could easily miss a crucial technical step. With so much at stake, you can’t afford easy-to-avoid missteps before even getting into court.
Maximizing Your Compensation
The next major factor in hiring experienced aviation lawyers is ensuring you receive the highest possible compensation for your injuries and trauma. These specialized attorneys know all the key arguments for establishing higher damages.
Proving Emotional Injuries
While physical injuries are obvious grounds for damages, aviation laws also allow compensation for severe emotional and psychological trauma. This includes things like:
- PTSD and anxiety from the incident
- Inability to fly or travel due to fear
- Mental anguish and emotional pain/suffering
But proving you truly suffer legitimate emotional injuries worthy of high payouts is really difficult. You’ll need lawyers who can make airtight cases supported by expert psychologists and therapists as witnesses. That’s their specialty.
Establishing Negligence
To get even higher damages, you’ll need evidence that the airline was negligent in some way that enabled the accident, not just compensating for an unavoidable freak incident. Things like:
- Lack of proper safety training
- Faulty equipment or poor maintenance
- Violation of FAA guidelines and best practices
This could open the door to getting punitive damages, which are like fines meant to further punish the airline for reckless behavior – on top of your compensation. Aviation lawyers know the ins-and-outs of proving the 5 elements of negligence and building these complex negligence arguments.
Maximizing Settlement Offers
Having a team of top aviation attorneys also signals to the airline’s insurance company that you’re absolutely ready for a protracted, high-stakes legal battle if need be. This incentivizes them to negotiate much larger settlement offers from the start.
If they think you just have some general personal injury lawyer, they’ll likely lowball assuming you can’t afford to take it all the way to trial. But they know the biggest aviation law firms have the resources and reputations for securing maximum damages – making it worth settling for more.
The Long Haul Advantage
In addition to initially maximizing your compensation, aviation cases often end up being extremely long and complex legal battles spanning years. This is another key area where experienced aviation attorneys provide a huge advantage over general practice lawyers.
Appeals and Motions for Ages
Aviation disaster lawsuits frequently get bogged down in endless appeal after appeal as each side tries to get minor rulings or pieces of evidence included or excluded. This tedious process can drag cases out for over a decade!
Aviation litigators live for this lengthy procedural guerrilla warfare though, while inexpensive firms might pressure you to just settle quickly instead. Top aviation attorneys relish the long haul and have the resources to see it through.
Dealing with New Claims
It’s also very common in these aviation cases for new issues and lawsuits to keep emerging even after you think it’s over. Maybe delayed injuries surface years later, or new laws get passed that revive past cases.
Aviation lawyers have strategies for handling this constant renewal of claims activity, rather than being caught off-guard. They plan for the long haul and have systems for monitoring all the latest developments – giving your case the best chance of prevailing over new obstacles.
Staying Motivated for the Marathon
Finally, the biggest asset in hiring true aviation specialists is their drive and motivation to pursue these intricate cases as long as humanly possible until maximal results are achieved.
For smaller practices, the grind of an aviation lawsuit quickly becomes exhausting and financially draining. They might push for a fast settlement just to end their involvement. But the top aviation firms have a vested professional interest in these niche cases which fuel their entire livelihood. They’re truly obsessed and built for the marathon.
Cost Isn’t an Obstacle
At this point, you’re probably thinking: “This all sounds great, but hiring expensive aviation lawyers is going to cost a fortune I can’t afford!”
Actually, that’s a myth – because most top aviation law firms like Husain Law + Associates Aviation Accident Attorneys always operate on a contingency fee basis. This means you don’t pay anything upfront. The firm only gets paid later as a percentage of any settlement or verdict they win for you.
So just like a local personal injury attorney, these elite aviation lawyers accept huge financial risk in taking on your case. They only make money if they deliver you a positive result – which is why they’ll tenaciously fight for the highest damages possible without you having to worry about legal bills until they prevail.
In the wake of an aviation disaster like this Singapore turbulence incident, the physical, emotional, and financial tolls can leave victims feeling powerless. You suffered enough already, the last thing you need is a prolonged legal mismatch against an airline’s army of corporate attorneys.
By entrusting your case to a specialized aviation law firm, you level the playing field completely. Not only do they understand every intricacy of the applicable laws and evidence needed, their entire purpose centers on maximizing results for people exactly in your circumstances.
From complex international treaties to repeated appeal gauntlets to the very fundamentals of preserving claims for years or decades into the future – these are the heavyweights truly equipped to make immensely powerful adversaries like airlines properly accountable for any negligence while securing every single penny their victims deserve.
So although the sticker shock of hiring elite representation may initially give pause, the access they provide to justice and rightful compensation ultimately proves invaluable. This upper-echelon expertise represents your strongest possible chance at finding remuneration and closure after enduring the unthinkable trauma of a catastrophic aviation incident.
