Owners fined over waterfall death

The owners of an adventure centre in Galloway where a schoolgirl died on holiday have been fined £16,000 for failing to ensure her safety.

Laura McDairmant, 15, from Carlisle, died after falling on to rocks during a pool jumping activity in July 2006.

At Kirkcudbright Sheriff Court, the Abernethy Trust pled guilty to not properly managing the risks.

Sheriff Kenneth Hogg said the trust had failed Laura and the fine marked the revulsion of the community.

He said no fine could remedy the criminally culpable death.

In a statement, Lorimer Gray, executive director of the Abernethy Trust said: "Our thoughts and prayers are with the McDairmant family.

"Until Laura's death we had operated for 35 years without major incident or injury. We are determined to learn whatever lessons we can from her tragic death."

Protruding rocks

Earlier, the Crown had accepted not guilty pleas from two instructors, Gareth Alcorn and Richard Farrell, who were working on the day Laura died.

The schoolgirl was on an adventure holiday at the Abernethy Trust centre at Barcaple, near Ringford, in Galloway.

One of the activities involved "gorge-jumping" - leaping into a deep pool on the Grey Mare's Tail burns near Black Loch in the Galloway Forest Park.

However, Laura struck protruding rocks and died the next day in Dumfries Infirmary.

The Inverness-shire based Abernethy Trust, which runs the activity centre, was accused of failing to ensure Laura's safety and permitting its employees to use a site for gorge-jumping that was unsafe.

Mr Alcorn, of Coleraine in Northern Ireland, and Mr Farrell, of Barcaple, had denied failing to recognise the hazards involved and permitting and encouraging the girl to make the jump from a cliff directly above the rocks.

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