Forensic experts are working to identify deaths from crash in Manitoba

DAUPHIN, male. It’s a nasty job, but someone’s got to do it.

In the aftermath of Thursday’s fiery bus crash that killed 15 people just outside Carberry, Man. — mostly senior citizens from the town of Dauphin who were on a field trip to the casino — lives no longer depend on the work of the experts charged with piecing together the deceased’s identities.

While RCMP says all families who lost a loved one were notified by Friday evening, work to determine who is who among the dead is still ongoing, providing definitive answers – including a public list of victims – for a community and a country be delayed , Still in shock.

But the meticulous examinations being conducted of broken and burned bodies and the recovered teeth, fingerprints and genetic material from the crash site on the TransCanada Highway are vital to shocked family members trying to mourn their loss.

Dauphin City Councilman Randy Daley stepped out into the sunlight on Saturday afternoon, taking a short break from his post at the curling rink where officials had gathered social workers and mental health professionals and even a few therapy dogs, all ready to welcome anyone who offered the support. might need.

Almost overnight, his small town of neat, tree-lined streets had become the epicenter of a national wave of grief. Here there is a sense that the clash had knocked out a destructive portion of the town elders who, while not yet named individually, represented collective leadership. Signs saying #dauphinstrong still popped up on the roadsides.

“There’s a lot of unknowns,” says Daley, who was elected to the city council last fall after retiring from a career as an RCMP officer, in which he learned the aftermath of road accidents all too well. Yet this one is on a horrifying scale.

The lack of official identification has been hard on loved ones, he says: “I don’t know if I would want to be in that position because I would go ‘I know what it means, but what does it mean?’”

For the team of forensic pathologists, anthropologists, dentists and fingerprint experts, it’s a deadly serious task – one that draws on some of the worst mass casualties in recent history, including the 2018 Saskatchewan bus crash that left 16 members of the Humboldt to die. came to life. Broncos hockey team, the 2013 train derailment that killed 47 people in Lac-Megantic, Que., and the 2014 fire that killed 32 residents of a retirement home in Isle Verte, Que.

“I have two statements about mass disasters: haste makes waste; and on-the-job is not the place to get on-the-job training,” said Dr. Bob Wood, a dental consultant and former chief forensic odontologist at the Ontario Coroner’s Office.

The identities of those killed in the crash have not been released and may not be revealed for the next few days, said Dr. John Younes, Manitoba’s chief medical examiner, at a news conference Friday.

Visual identification of the dead is difficult due to damage from the truck collision and subsequent fire that turned the bus carrying the 25 passengers into a charred hull. The day after the accident, a piece of scorched grass that was several times the length of the bus could still be seen at the scene of the accident.

“The reason we need to undertake scientific means of investigation or identification is that most if not all of the deceased have significant facial trauma,” he said at the afternoon briefing. “So identifying visually is not possible.”

The identification would be based on fingerprints, dental records, surgical histories — such as hip or knee replacements or medical prostheses — and DNA, Younes said.

Such a mass casualty is thankfully rare in Canada, but the professionals tasked with understanding the tragedy have extensive training and well-developed procedures for handling the bodies.

“It’s the same thing, just a different version of doing a one-body identification,” says Wood, who is also an associate professor in the University of Toronto’s dental school.

It is common to divide forensic investigators into two or three teams.

One team collects and examines the medical and dental records of those who have gone missing following an incident. They note any history of broken bones, medical procedures, implants, fillings, or root canals that may help distinguish one body from another.

Meanwhile, a second team performs scans, X-rays and other research on the remains recovered from a death scene.

It is then a task to try to match the pre-death data with the recovered human remains – a task that is sometimes assigned to a separate ‘reconciliation team’.

“It’s surprising how small differences in restoration pattern and missing teeth make big differences in the ability to tell one body from another,” said Wood, who also worked in Thailand identifying victims of the 2004 tsunami.

Dental records were key to identifying the remains of those killed in the Lac-Megantic train derailment, which resulted in a fire fueled by crude oil that burned for days after the crash.

The dead in the Carberry bus accident include two men and 13 women. Unlike on an airplane or a train, the victims may not have been seated in pre-assigned seats. While most of the seniors — they ranged in age from 58 to 88 — not all belonged to the same club or group, and all signed up for the trip independently.

The intensity of the fire after the crash may have burned wallets, purses, jewelry, tattoos, moles, or other easily visible personal markings.

And while it may still be possible to identify the two men just by looking at them, pathologists can also look for physiological markers, such as pelvic bones, which are wider in a woman than in a man, as well as things like pacemakers. , surgical screws, or other evidence of unique prior procedures.

But Wood cautioned that positively identifying one of the male victims cannot be used to identify the second man through a simple process of elimination.

“If you find A, it doesn’t mean the other is necessarily B,” he said.

“Scientific identification” — that is, identification by fingerprints, dental records, medical records, or DNA — “is the preferred choice of the forensic pathologist.”

And the more points of positive identification, the better it is to avoid a mistake.

In 2018, one of the Humboldt Broncos players – injured but alive – woke up in the hospital to find he had been listed as one of those killed in the bus crash, a mix-up attributed to the team’s use of photos and information to identify the victims.

Using DNA would drag out the process longer, said Lelia Watamaniuk, a consulting forensic anthropologist for the Ontario Forensic Pathology Service.

“It’s terrible to have to wait. But the processes themselves are not instantaneous processes,” she said.

“The chemical process of DNA takes some time. It’s not just sprayed into a bottle and you walk to the other side of the room to get the print.”

In some cases, she said, it could take weeks, depending on the lab’s workload. And the more people involved in the accident, the more complex that process becomes. Chief medical examiner John Eunice, speaking at a media briefing, suggested analysis and comparison of the DNA would likely take at least a week in this case.

“There is always a balance between the family’s feelings and the need to do the job well,” said Watamaniuk. “It’s frustrating. And we fully appreciate the grief and frustration of the families. Research is ongoing in those areas to make it faster and more reliable.

But in the end what is most important is that no mistakes are made.

“It’s tragic and horrible and it’s a lot to ask, but it’s better that it’s done right,” Watamaniuk said.

It is demanding work that can also be emotionally taxing, although steps are also taken to address the psychological state of the professionals.

One of Wood’s mentors, who was sent to Guyana in the aftermath of the Jonestown massacre, which resulted in the deaths of 900 cult members, recalled that there was a ban on soldiers responsible for collecting and transporting the remains to to stay with one particular body. fear of becoming emotionally attached to the victims.

“The best way you can help these people,” Wood said, “is by appropriately identifying them and returning them to their loved ones.”

With files from Steve McKinley

Allan Woods is a Montreal-based staff reporter for the Star. He deals with global and national affairs. Follow him on Twitter: @WoodsAllan

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