A man is fighting for his life after surviving an 8,000-mile flight stowed in the landing gear of a plane, from which another man is thought to have fallen to his death in Richmond.
A man believed to be aged 24 was found on Friday morning (June 19) at around 8.30am in the undercarriage of an aircraft which had completed a 10-hour journey from Johannesburg, South Africa, to Heathrow Airport.
Just over an hour later police were called to the roof of an office block in Kew Road, Richmond, under the Heathrow flight path, where a man's body had been found.
Police say there is no evidence at this stage to link the two incidents but this is one line of enquiry they are pursuing.
Officers believe they know the identity of the survivor, who was taken to a west London hospital where he was, on Friday afternoon, said to be in a critical condition. His nationality has not been made public.
The identity of the dead man is not yet known and police say they are unsure how long he had been on the roof of the building, in Kew Road, close to Richmond station, which is home to the online retailer notonthehighstreet.com.
Police said his death was being treated as unexplained and a post-mortem examination is scheduled to take place on Tuesday (June 23) at Kingston Hospital.
If the man is found to have fallen during the flight, it would not be the first time a stowaway has plunged to his death in the borough, which is where planes open their landing gear on the approach to Heathrow.
In September 2012, a man was found dead on a pavement in Portman Avenue, East Sheen, having apparently fallen from the landing gear of a British Airways flight from Angola to Heathrow. He was later identified as José Matada, a 26-year-old believed to hail from Mozambique.
In 2001, the body of Mohammed Ayaz, a 21-year-old Pakistani, was found in the car park of Homebase in Richmond. Four years earlier, another stowaway reportedly fell to his death onto a gasworks near the store.
Anyone with any information about the man's death is asked to call Richmond police on 101.
