Post-mortem Examinations on Air-crash Victims

On October 31, 1950, a Viking aircraft of British European Airways, flying from Paris to London, crashed in thikk fog at London Airport. The wreckage burst into flames and 28 out of the 30 occupants of the plane were killed. Port-mortem examinations on all the victims were ordered by the coroner of the district, for the purposes of identification and to determine the cause of death. Since the religious tenets of many of the victims required a rapid burial the examination of the remains became something of an urgent problem.