Gas alert 11 days before death in Earl’s cottage

A CARBON monoxide alert was raised about an aristocrat’s holiday cottage shortly before the poisoning death of a student, a fatal accident inquiry has heard.

Stirling University student Tom Hill, 18, died 11 days after the holiday home operator was told about a previous tenant becoming unwell.

The farm company owned by the Earl of Dalhousie and his heir Lord Ramsay has already been fined £120,000 after admitting health and safety breaches at the rental property.

Retired private school teacher Piers Le Cheminant – who sublet the cottage to others – was also fined £2,000 after a court heard carbon monoxide could have killed visitors over a period of nearly eight years.

Now a Fatal Accident Inquiry at Forfar Sheriff Court has heard that a previous guest at Glenmark Cottage in rural Tarfside had reported becoming physically unwell during her stay. The carbon monoxide alarm had also sounded.

Mr Le Cheminant, 77, who rented out the holiday home on behalf of Burghill Farms, was told about the alarm on October 17, 2015.

Mr Hill, from Hampshire, died on October 28. An investigation found that cracks in a bathroom heater led to it producing carbon monoxide at dangerous levels in the ramshackle cottage.

Lord Ramsay’s Dalhousie Estate-based farm company and Mr Le Cheminant were fined for exposing holidaymakers to the risk of injury or death from poisoning.

Sheriff Gillian Wade said: ‘For a period of seven-and-a-half years, people using the cottage were exposed to the risk.’

The hearing, before Sheriff Reid, is expected to conclude later this month.