British soldier drowned after failings by training company, coroner rules

Inquest hears how Private John Lomas could not swim and should not have been allowed on the water under MoD rules

Private John Lomas, 22, was based in Germany with the Royal Logistics Corps

Failings by an adventure training company contributed to the drowning of a young British soldier when his whitewater raft capsized, a coroner has ruled.

Private John Lomas, 22, who was based in Germany with the Royal Logistics Corps, could not swim and should not have been allowed on the water under Ministry of Defence (MoD) rules, an inquest was told.

Assistant Staffordshire coroner Margaret Jones, recording a verdict of misadventure, said she was concerned there was a risk that the circumstances in which Pte Thomas died may reoccur.

Her concerns followed evidence which suggested the company failed to carry out proper risk assessments of the river, overloaded the raft Pte Lomas was in, failed to carry out water confidence tests, chose a dangerous place to launch a raft with an inexperienced crew, and did not have a safety kayak on standby in case anyone got into difficulties.

The company was cleared of manslaughter charges in an Austrian court. But Ms Jones said she would be writing to the adventure rafting company – Sports Camp Tirol – highlighting the risks even though the Austrian company was outside her jurisdiction.

She said she would also send a copy to the MoD after expressing concern at the continued use of the company to provide rafting adventures for British forces. Her letter would cover “basic measures which they should be carrying out in any event,” she said.

One of the owners of the company and the raft guide both declined to give evidence, the hearing was told.

Pte Thomas, from Meir, Stoke-on-Trent, drowned on the River Inn in June 2012. The inquest heard that on the day of the incident, a water management company which controlled a dam on the river close to the raft launch site, carried out a “stowage discharge” which increased the volume of the fast-flowing river by a third.

The rafts carrying the soldiers launched when the flood of water was at its peak. The training company, the inquest heard, did not liaise with the water company and were unaware of the increased water. One soldier declined to take part in the exercise after seeing the conditions.

The inquest heard conflicting evidence about whether the soldiers taking part had been asked whether they could swim or not prior to the adventure training.

The Army has since made “very considerable changes” to procedures to ensure the circumstances could not be repeated, the coroner said.