A British Airways stewardess who was badly injured after being flung in the air by turbulence is suing the airline for £72,500, over claims her pilot flew ‘in the danger zone’ too close to a storm.
Laura Lanigan, 56, was left in agony after the BA Boeing 777 she was crewing suffered a ‘violent drop’ while in the sky above Mumbai, India, in June 2019.
The veteran stewardess, of Richmond, Surrey, was in the plane’s galley as it prepared for landing when it suffered a ‘sudden and severe’ bout of turbulence, rising and dropping quickly.
She was hurled into the air and crashed back to the floor, fracturing her knee and dislocating her shoulder, with an unsecured drinks canister then falling on top of her.
Mrs Lanigan, who had worked for BA for nearly 30 years, is now suing the airline for £72,500, claiming her accident was caused by the pilot steering too close to a storm cloud.
The pilot should have seen or spotted signs of a nearby cumulonimbus cloud – a ‘large, dark storm cloud’ – and taken steps, in line with protocol, to stay more than 20 miles away from it, she claims.
BA lawyers are fighting the damages claim, arguing there was no visual evidence of a storm cloud and nothing on the weather radar to suggest one.
Instead, an operating officer on the flight deck had reported only ‘fluffy white clouds’ in the sky, the company’s barrister Peter Savory told the court.
Laura Lanigan, 56, was left in agony after the BA Boeing 777 she was crewing suffered a ‘violent drop’ while in the sky above Mumbai, India, in June 2019 (Pictured: Mrs Lanigan outside London’s Royal Courts of Justice)
Sitting at Central London County Court, Judge David Saunders heard Mrs Lanigan’s jet was coming to the end of a nine-hour journey from London Heathrow to Mumbai when she suffered her injury.
Her lawyers said there had been ‘mild to moderate’ turbulence towards the end of the flight and the passenger seat belt warning signs had been turned on.
But shortly before the plane was due to land, it suffered a more extreme jolt, sending her flying into the air in the galley and crashing back down.
Giving evidence, Mrs Lanigan told the judge the flight had been too ‘bumpy’ to serve hot drinks to passengers with the breakfast service.
However, the severe movement which caused her injury was ‘unexpected,’ she said.
Landing heavily, she twisted her left knee, having already hit her shoulder on galley furniture, with the unsecured water canister then falling on her afterwards.
As the plane continued to experience turbulence when it came to land, Mrs Lanigan was then unable to get to a seat, she claimed, telling the judge: ‘I remember trying to move. It felt like forever.’
She said although the passenger seat belt signs were on, she used her judgment as a crew member and continued to work on her feet.
There are different thresholds for when passengers and crew members have to sit and strap in, she told the judge, since staff still have to look after the passengers.
‘If you feel you can’t put one foot in front of the other, if you feel unsafe, you sit down and strap in,’ she said. ‘I did what I thought was best at the time.’
She was eventually taken off the plane in a wheelchair.
Mrs Lanigan, who had worked for BA for nearly 30 years, is now suing the airline for £72,500, claiming her accident was caused by the pilot steering too close to a storm cloud (Pictured: Mrs Lanigan in 2023)
Her barrister, Sinclair Cramsie, claimed the accident was the fault of the pilot in not identifying and steering clear of a cumulonimbus storm cloud.
Mr Cramsie said the plane was within 20 miles of the cloud and the pilot should have either diverted further away from it or told the cabin crew to sit down and belt up.
‘We say the path that was being taken was sufficiently proximate to the cumulonimbus cloud that it was within the danger zone,’ he argued.
‘The turbulence was described by Mrs Lanigan as the worst turbulence she had experienced in circa 30 years flying.’
He said expert weather evidence suggested that, given the low altitude at which the bump was experienced, it was likely to have been thermal turbulence caused by cumulonimbus clouds.
‘It is implicit in [the expert’s] conclusion that the clouds must have been sufficiently close to have caused this severe turbulence,’ he added.
But for BA, Mr Savory said: ‘The defendant’s case is quite simply that the pilot made proper observations. Whatever they saw, the pilots say it wasn’t a cumulonimbus.
‘In using the weather radar on the aircraft, they didn’t see anything indicative of a cumulonimbus.
‘We say this was a single bump of turbulence. It was nothing more.’
He said Mrs Lanigan and other crew had been briefed about possible weather conditions before takeoff and that a cyclone which had been of concern was avoided.
He continued: ‘She was given a further warning of possible bumpy weather two hours from landing. The seat belt sign was switched on one hour before landing, some 40 to 45 minutes prior to the incident.
‘All of these are indicative of the pilots being cogniscent of the need to take reasonable care of the crew.
‘Neither she nor any crew member elected or made comment that it was necessary or even advisable to be seated.
‘Against the observations and navigational decisions of the pilots, and the observed limited turbulence prior to the index event, any instruction to the crew to cease passenger service and to be seated and restrained was neither required, or even advisable.’
The case continues.
