Lawyers receive draft Clutha crash report

The content of the report is confidential until interested parties have had the opportunity to query or challenge the conclusions reached by government investigators.

Lawyers acting for Police Scotland, Bond, aircraft manufacturer Airbus Helicopter, and Eurocopter have all received copies of the report as well.

The Crown Office will decide whether to launch a prosecution or a Fatal Accident Inquiry (FAI) after the final report has been published.

An initial AAIB report identified double engine failure as the reason the helicopter crashed, but did not identify the cause of the failure.

In February, First Minister Nicola Sturgeon revealed that she had written to Prime Minister David Cameron to urge that he expedite the investigation while criticising the AAIB for “lacking respect and understanding” of the Scottish legal system.

Sturgeon said she shared the solicitor general for Scotland’s concern at “the dearth of information flow and lack of respect for and understanding of the obligations of the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service and the police in relation to this investigation, and in particular in relation to the bereaved families”.

A meeting took place between the AAIB and the Crown Office eight days after the letter was sent.

An AAIB spokesman told The Herald: “The draft report has been circulated to ‘interested parties’, as defined by the AAIB’s regulations, and the final report is due in the middle of 2015.”