British Airways has been fined over £3.2 million (over €3.8 million) after two baggage handlers suffered falls at work, sustaining horrific injuries. Southwark crown court heard the carrier had been warned about the danger and failed to act to prevent the incidents.
Both workers fell through gaps in guardrails on “televators” – a piece of equipment used to held load luggage into aircraft – in “near identical” accidents at Heathrow Airport, just months apart, resulting in a Health and Safety Executive investigation.
The accidents
Ravinder Teji was working on a short-haul airbus 320 flight when he injured his back and cut his head in a 1.5m fall in August 2022. Shahjahan Malik, unloading a long-haul flight from Seattle, plunged three metres resulting in “more serious injuries”, Judge Brendan Finucane KC told the court, including facial fractures and “a bleed on the brain which was obviously so serious that he ended up being sent to a central London hospital.”
Malik’s jaw had to be sewn shut and he was on medication and a fluid diet for months but “still suffers from ongoing pain and headaches from what happened to him,” Finucane continued.
Both situations were preventable, the court heard. For over a decade, televators had been operating with reduced guard rails after cutbacks in 2011. On three previous occasions, baggage handlers had slipped but had escaped serious injury. A health and safety inspector raised the problem and issued a notice of contravention in March 2022, pointing out the risk of falls, but British Airways did not take the remedial action it was told to before Teji’s accident, a failure the judge called “regrettable.”
A warning for the industry
Although Finucane recognised the equipment in question is in “standard” use across the industry, he said the criminal prosecution of BA should “send a red warning light” to airlines and airports worldwide.
Passing sentence, he took into account the British flag carrier’s operating profits of €2.45 billion and ordered the firm to pay more than £1.333 million (€1.6 million) and £1.875 million (€2.2 million) for the incidents respectively. The airline must also pay out £20,935 (around €25,000) in costs plus a victim surcharge of £120 (€142).
Responding to the case, a BA spokesman said: “Safety is always our highest priority, and we deeply regret that despite the measures we had in place, these incidents occurred.” The men have been returned to work in alternative roles with necessary adjustments.