Scandinavian Airline System has announced an immediate payment of £17,000 sterling to relatives of each of the passengers killed in the Milan air crash.
The payout was revealed by SAS boss Mr Jorgen Lindegaard.
104 passengers were killed when the SAS airliner crashed yesterday at Milan's Linate airport after colliding with a Cessna plane.
A total of 118 people died in the accident.
Mr Lindegaard says the lack of ground radar, normally used to track planes on the runway in poor visibility, was not a factor in the disaster.
The MD-87 airliner hit the Cessna plane which strayed into its path as it reached take-off speed.
SAS said it will operate from Milan's second airport until the end of this week, and that its employees observed a minute's silence today at all its offices and airport counters worldwide.
Mr Lindegaard says: "With or without ground radar we would fly into Linate. We fly into many airports with or without ground radar, therefore it is not a security requirement to have ground radar.
"We have no reason to believe, and we had no reason to believe, that Linate is not a safe airport."