A roofing contractor has been ordered to pay more than £21 million in damages after a flick of a switch caused a catastrophic fire at a West Midlands factory.

The blaze, which tore through Mueller Europe Ltd’s copper tubing factory in Bilston in the early hours of  November 9, 2008, was caused by gas heaters which ignited a scaffolding deck put up by contractors carrying out re-roofing work.

Central Roofing (South Wales) Ltd had been working on the roof as the factory continued to operate below, London’s High Court heard.

Scaffolding was boarded and sheeted as a “birdcage” structure using flammable materials.

It enclosed two heaters that were used to warm the factory.

When the heaters were switched on the fire began.

The factory was left a smoking ruin, with part of its roof collapsed and massive damage caused to its contents.

The blaze led to a legal battle where a top judge ruled Central Roofing liable to pay Mueller a total of £21,357,889.

Mr Justice Stuart-Smith said: “The birdcage scaffold enclosed the heaters so that they were only a short distance above the surface of the scaffold’s floor.

“Once enclosed by the combustible materials of the completed birdcage scaffold, the heaters were an obvious fire hazard, which should have been appreciated by anyone who turned their mind to the question.”

The judge said that the “immediate trigger” for the fire was the inadvertent turning on of a switch and that was “the foreseeable, even predictable, consequence of the systemic failings on both sides that had preceded it.”

Although Mueller should have made sure the enclosed heaters were switched off, Central bore the primary responsibility to carry out the work safely and to point out the obvious hazard.

There had been three previous incidents when heaters were switched on when they should not have been, said the judge, who added: “Central continued to take no steps to carry out the works safely when they knew that Mueller was not routinely isolating and the failure to isolate had already caused ‘near misses’.”

Finding the Bridgend-based roofing company liable to compensate Mueller for the damage to the factory, its contents, equipment and interruption of its business, the judge said Central Roofing’s breaches of contract “were an effective or dominant cause of the fire”.

Mueller’s lawyers had argued that the scaffold deck was less than a metre away from the heaters and that a fire was “all but inevitable” if they were switched on.

Story Via: birminghammail.co.uk