A British Airways plane sustained “significant damage” when its nose hit the ground at Heathrow Airport on 18 June last year, an investigation has found.

The Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB) described the incident as an “inadvertent nose landing gear retraction whilst parked on stand,” and is currently investigating further.

The Boeing 787-8 was parked up ahead of its next flight to Frankfurt at London Heathrow Airport; in a statement filed under the documents used during the investigation’s consultation stage, the AAIB refers to pre-departure maintenance tasks being completed on the landing gear doors.

It says that “when the landing gear lever was moved to up, the nose landing gear (NLG) retracted”. This meant that “the aircraft’s nose struck the ground causing significant damage to the lower front section of the aircraft and inflicting minor injuries to one of the cargo loading team.”

The Press Association reports that “the force of the impact with the ground caused some onboard passenger oxygen masks to drop and overhead baggage compartment doors to open” and that “doors were partially detached from their hinges and deep scratches were scored into the fuselage skin.”

AAIB summarised the incident: “The investigation identified that the NLG downlock pin had inadvertently been inserted in the downlock link assembly apex pin bore instead of the downlock pin hole.”

A British Airways spokesperson said: “Safety is always our priority and we’ve put a number of stringent measures in place to help mitigate the chance of an incident like this happening again in the future.”

The deadline for meeting an Airworthiness Directive is on 16 January 2023, after installation of “an insert over the apex pin bore to prevent incorrect installation of the downlock pin” was requested by this date.

AAIB said that a final report will be published in due course: “The investigation continues and will consider the safety procedures associated with landing gear maintenance, and the factors which may have contributed to the NLG downlock pin being incorrectly installed in the apex pin inner bore.”

The Independent has approached British Airways for further comment.

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