If your company has a crisis that results in the loss of life, the families of the deceased will look to you for answers. While your company, staff and government agency personnel have the best intentions, they typically do not have the necessary experience, training or support staff to address the unique challenges they will face when working directly with families affected by crisis.

Kenyon’s Special Assistance Team (SAT) Members provide the interface between survivors, family and friends of those directly impacted by the event and the various people, agencies and businesses involved in the response. It is a crucial role that can greatly impact the overall success or failure of any response.

Following the first responders, typically about 24-48 hours after an incident, Kenyon SAT Members are deployed to work directly with survivors, family members and friends of those directly impacted by the event. We strongly recommend that our clients also have key staff members trained as SAT Members to be involved and work alongside those provided by Kenyon. This is important for many reasons, most especially because the families will have company representatives intimately involved in the process. These specially trained and screened Kenyon Team Members are equipped to immediately work with people under great stress in a variety of cultural situations and geographical locations.

Their job is to help transition the survivors, families and friends through the aftermath of a horrible event. It is both a practical and emotional role, requiring special skills. Family members receive an onslaught of information that, at times, can be confusing and overwhelming. They need to know what that information means for them. Our SAT Members join Kenyon with the required empathetic and soft skills to handle these family members with care. Kenyon also trains SAT members to “translate” all of the information family members receive so they understand how it will affect them.

Kenyon Special Assistance Teams are organised into four major sections:

Family Assistance Centre Support:

Works with survivors, family and friends who are located at the Family Assistance Centre coordinating attendance at briefings, collecting information and arranging for their return home. The information collected includes reference DNA samples to aid in identifications, vital next of kin information to aid in decision-making processes, as well many other items that may be required by the company or government.

Hospital Support:

Works with hospital staff, injured survivors and their families to ensure they receive logistical support and appropriate information. Kenyon’s SAT members can also provide assistance in the transition from a hospital location to a home setting, including support for changing mobility and care needs.

Identification and Repatriation Support Liaison:

Works directly with Kenyon or government morgue administrative staff to ensure the timely and accurate collection of ante-mortem records, as well as DNA reference sample collection and personal effect collection as needed. They also assist in coordinating the repatriation of deceased.

Non-Travelling Family Member Support:

Works directly with family and friends who did not or cannot travel to the Family Assistance Centre. In many instances, the SAT members travel to the non-travelling family’s location to provide information and support, collect reference DNA material, and assist the family in understanding what happens next and how it will affect them.