Patrick Boylan, Will Francis & Chris Brierly examine costs issues arising from the Buncefield litigation
The Buncefield litigation was one of the largest cases in the Commercial Court in 2008. At its height, it involved over a hundred parties. The claimant group was diverse, spanning individual home owners whose property had suffered damage, to the oil majors BP and Shell.
While the legal issues in the case were complex, the facts were straightforward. On 11 December 2005, petrol from an underground pipeline was being received into an overground storage tank.
The operator on duty negligently failed to switch the flow to a further empty tank once the original one had become full.
This resulted in 300 tonnes of fuel overflowing from the tank, which subsequently formed a vapour cloud, which then ignited and generated the biggest explosion ever to have taken place in peacetime Europe.
Denial
Over the following two and a half years the defendant (Total) denied negligence,
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