This archive report was first published on 9 July 2019.
July 9, 2019, marked a week since a stowaway passenger dropped off the landing gear of a Kenya Airways aircraft moments before landing at London's Heathrow Airport. Despite a multi-agency investigation, the passenger's identity remains unknown.
The investigation team has reviewed over 1,000 hours of CCTV footage, with no signs of intrusion or suspicious activity observed. All staff and stakeholders who were on duty on June 30, 2019, have been accounted for, and employees who were on duty on June 29 and 30, 2019, are still being interviewed.
Kenya Airports Authority stated that none of the interviewed ground staff and crew have reported any suspicious activities or observations during the period in question. The authority also confirmed that the airport's perimeter fence is 100 percent intact and that all entry points to the airside at JKIA are 100 percent functional.
British authorities have supplied Kenya with the fingerprints of the body to help identify the stowaway in Kenya if he is Kenyan. The Metropolitan Police in London informed KQ officials of the Sunday incident, and the airline said that on June 30 at about 3:41 pm (UK time), a body of a yet-to-be-identified man landed in a garden in the Borough of Lambeth, South London.
The high altitude flown by planes on such routes would make it impossible for a person to survive, with temperatures at cruising altitude getting as low as minus 56 °C and oxygen supply diminishing.
