Stowaway falls to death from BA flight over London, second survives

One of two stowaways has plunged to his death from a passenger plane as it landed at a London airport, with a second miraculously surviving.

The men stowed away on a BA flight from Johannesburg, hiding themselves in the undercarriage of a Boeing 747 for just under 11 and half hours over the course of the 8,000 mile flight to London Heathrow.

The dead man fell onto the roof of an online clothing shop in Kew, south west London.

The second man, aged between 25 and 30, is in a serious condition in a west London hospital, Sky News reported.

A spokeswoman for BA told IBTimes UK: "This is a live investigation. We are working with the Metropolitan Police and the police in Johannesburg to establish the facts surrounding this.

"It is obviously a very rare situation."

Scotland Yard said in a statement: "Officers and the London Ambulance Service attended and found the body of a dead man on the roof of a business premises.

"The death is currently being treated as unexplained.

"A post-mortem examination will be held in due course and inquiries are ongoing to establish the male's identity. No arrests have been made."

In September 2012, Jose Matada, 26, died after falling from the undercarriage of a flight from Angola to Heathrow on to a street in Mortlake, west London.

An inquest heard he may have survived freezing temperatures of up to minus 60C (76F) for most of the 12-hour flight, but it was believed he was "dead or nearly dead" by the time he hit the ground.