The Danish Disaster Victim Identification effort in the Thai tsunami: organisation and results

Following the December 2004 tsunami in Thailand experts from many countries, including Denmark, went to Thailand to help with identification work. The Interpol system for Disaster Victim Identification (DVI) was employed for the identification of the many casualties. This paper describes the work of the Danish teams in Thailand from the 30th December 2004 until the 6th June 2005. The investigation covers all Danes reported missing directly after the tsunami in Thailand on the 26th December 2004 and who were later found deceased, or, in one case, never recovered. The AM and PM forms were reviewed retrospectively and the relevant information compared. Forensic odontology alone was responsible for 70.3% of identifications, and in two more cases (5.4%) the identification was established using a combination of odontology and fingerprint information. Fingerprints were used to establish identity in 8 cases (21.6%). DNA-typing was only used in one identification, in combination with fingerprinting data. Only one Danish victim was not identified. This review of the 37 Danish cases confirms that odontological examination yielded the most identifications, fingerprint data much fewer, and DNA was only used to a small extent, due to organisational problems with the examination and because the initial samples were of inferior quality.