ABSTRACT
The term Disaster Victim Identification (DVI) is used to describe the procedures which may be applied in case of an event with many fatalities, surpassing the possibility of the authorities to conduct identification using the normal standards. The events may be natural disasters such as earthquakes or man-made such as terrorist events or they may be accidents such as aircraft crashes or shipwreck. The participants in a DVI operation varies with the nation(s) involved but will usually be comprised of the police and medical experts, such as forensic pathologists, odontologists, geneticists and anthropologists. They must have plans for conducting the investigations and practice the procedures beforehand. There must be agreement as to the extent of the investigation. Ideally it will follow INTERPOL guidelines, involving the use of the three primary identifiers fingerprints (pressure ridge analysis), odontology and genetics, and if they fail, secondary identifiers (medical information and effects found on or near the body) may be used. Identification requires unequivocal agreement between the antemortem and the post-mortem information. The success of a DVI operation may be measured by the numbers identified but the prime object is to provide the relatives with certainty of the fate of their loved ones.
