A British Airways pilot made ‘beyond a rookie error’ when he accidentally triggered the emergency slide seconds before take-off.

BA flight BA886 was ready to depart from Heathrow Airport at 9.55am on Saturday when the emergency slide was activated.

The activation of the inflatable slide meant the plane could not take off, delaying the flight for hours and reportedly costing the airline £50,000.

Emergency services rushed to gate 24E, and passengers had to wait for more than three hours to continue their journey to Romania.

The Sun reports that the captain was immediately taken off flying duties.

He allegedly failed to disarm the plane door when he opened it to pass documents to members of the crew. If the door had been disarmed, the slide wouldn’t have deployed.

A source told The Sun: ‘The captain of all people would have known the safety rules around opening doors.

‘This is beyond a rookie error. It’s totally baffling to understand.’

British Airways confirmed to Metro.co.uk that the emergency slide was triggered in error, not an emergency, and that the aircraft has since returned to operation after engineers approved it as being safe to fly.

A spokesman said: ‘We apologised to customers for the delay and arranged a replacement aircraft to ensure they were able to continue their journey.’

Metro.co.uk contacted Heathrow Airport for more details but a spokesman declined to comment.

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