[Identification of cadavers in the Netherlands]

The identification of cadavers of unknown persons is important from a humanitarian point of view but also for legal reasons and in connection with insurance. Various identification techniques are available today, such as fingerprinting, DNA profiling and the comparison of dental structures. Not all methods of identification are equally useful in practice and the ultimate identification is often made possible only by a combination of several techniques. Sometimes, the identification procedure cannot be completed successfully because one has no idea whatsoever who it might be and there is therefore no material available for comparison. In the Netherlands, identification is in principle a task of the police. In case of a mass disaster in the Netherlands, or abroad when Dutch citizens are involved, a special Disaster Identification Team is activated, consisting mainly of police officers supplemented by external experts. Major disasters in which such a team has been involved in the past are the air crash in Faro (Portugal) in 1992 (56 victims), the air crash in Eindhoven in 1996 (32 victims) and the explosion of the fireworks plant in Enschede in 2000 (21 victims).