A jury have slammed health and safety failures at the Ministry of Defence’s Foulness Island base blaming them for the death of a government scientist.
Terry Jupp (pictured), who worked for the MoD’s Defence, Science and Technology Laboratory, died after chemicals he was mixing as part of a top secret counter-terrorism experiment spontaneously combusted causing fatal burns on the Foulness Island base on 14 August 2002.
Eight years on from the accident the inquest jury unanimously agreed that planning and risk assessments for the trials where Mr Jupp died were not appropriate and that this had contributed to Mr Jupp’s fatal accident.
They went onto conclude that potentially life-saving protective equipment had also been ignored that could have prevented the tragedy.
Jurors concluded in their narrative verdict that communication and organisation on the trials was “inadequate”.
The four week inquest has been held at Southend Coroner’s Court and has attracted much interest due to the secretive nature of much of the evidence.
Specialist safes were brought into the court to hold over 7,000 pages of evidence that had to be censored by the MoD as a matter of national security.
After the case Dr Frances Saunders, chief executive of DSTL, said: “First and foremost I want to offer my sympathies to Terry Jupp's wife and family.
“Some of the work that DSTL does is, by its very nature, extremely hazardous, but we aim to take every step we can to control and minimise the risk – clearly in this case the measures in place at the time did not safeguard Mr Jupp.
”Terry Jupp was carrying out work of national importance, helping protect the UK, its armed forces and its people, and I want to acknowledge publicly his contribution to his vital research.”
In closing the coroner, Dr Peter Dean, said: "Terry's family have remained a dignified presence at all times through every stage of what has been a very difficult journey for them since his loss. One hopes as many questions as possible have been answered for them."