Airport fined for polluting brook with plane de-icer

JUDGE ORDERS OVER £900K IN FINES AND COSTS

- By MARTIN NAYLOR

EAST Midlands Airport (EMA) has been fined nearly £900,000 for polluting a brook with deicing chemicals.

A judge at Derby Crown Court told the airport it had “failed to adequately invest in drainage systems” which led contaminated water leaching into the Trent and Diseworth Brook, leading to sewage fungus forming in both watercourses.

Managers had pleaded guilty to three environmental offences at an earlier hearing.

Fining the airport £892,500 and ordering it to pay £55,647.84 costs, Judge Martin Hurst said members of the public reported sewage fungus in both the Trent and Diseworth Brook in early 2021.

Investigations revealed leaking of contaminated water had come from what he called a poorly maintained storage pond.

The judge said: “In summary, this is a case about the defendant failing to adequately invest in drainage systems enabling, from 2015, many contaminated discharges into Diseworth Brook and the River Trent.