A British Airways cabin crew member was found dead on the streets of Johannesburg during a recent work layover, several local media outlets reported on Sunday.
Robert Gay, 52, was a veteran flight attendant for the Heathrow-based airline and mystery surrounds his sudden death.
Gay had reportedly gone out for dinner and drinks with other crew members following the 11 hours flight to South Africa from London. During the night he became separated from his colleagues and was later found collapsed in the street.
Sources claim paramedics fought to save his life but he was later pronounced dead. It is believed that he may have had a heart attack but detectives aren’t yet ruling out homicide because of the area of the city where Robert was found.
“It appears he returned to the hotel crew and separated from his friends and was found dead at 4 am on February 5th,” some source who claims to be close to the investigation said.
“The cause of death is believed to have been a heart attack, although full cognition results are pending.”
He was found with no visible injuries.
A spokesperson for British Airways said: “We’re deeply saddened by this news and our thoughts and sincere condolences are with our colleague’s family and friends at this sad time.”
“We’re providing support to all of our colleagues that may be affected by this sad news.”
British Airways has only recently restarted direct flights to Johannesburg after South Africa found itself once again on the UK’s pandemic travel Red List due to the Omicron variant.
BA operates its double-deck Airbus A380 to Johannesburg with up to 22 cabin crew members on every flight.
Mateusz Maszczynski honed his skills as an international flight attendant at the most prominent airline in the Middle East and has been flying ever since... most recently for a well known European airline. Matt is passionate about the aviation industry and has become an expert in passenger experience and human-centric stories. Always keeping an ear close to the ground, Matt's industry insights, analysis and news coverage is frequently relied upon by some of the biggest names in journalism.