Workshop on best practices on Accident Investigation was held under the Black and Caspian Sea regions Project on 3 - 4 June 2019 in Baku, Azerbaijan, and was attended by 16 representatives of the State Maritime Administration of Azerbaijan.

The workshop focussed on the international and EU legislative framework in the field of marine casualty investigation and on the sharing of national experiences for conducting such investigations.

EMSA staff and high-level experts from the Accident Investigation Bodies (AIB) of France (BEA-Mer), Greece (HBMCI) and Malta (MSIU) teamed up to picture the key principles governing the safety investigation, to offer an overview of the national setup and to introduce practices supporting the effective cooperation with other interested States (EU Member States and 3rd Countries) and national authorities.

EMSA and the MS experts stressed that the no-blame approach is a critical factor when undertaking a safety investigation; this should guide the whole process since the early stages until the drafting of the safety report.

Techniques to approach the accident site and the issues when collecting evidence were debated and good practices to raise the profile of the AIB were discussed as well.

Case studies were introduced by the MS experts to illustrate in detail the phases of the process and the practical issues encountered in the course of real investigation.

The event contributed to further developing the accident investigation capabilities of the State Maritime Administration of Azerbaijan and demonstrated the added value of the effective cooperation between the Agency and the EU Member States.