Widow sues Singapore Airlines after husband dies following severe turbulence

Linda Kitchen was ten hours into what was supposed to be the beginning of a six-week holiday when the aircraft suddenly fell out of the sky. She and her husband Geoff, whom she describes as her soul mate, had boarded a Singapore Airlines flight from London Heathrow in May 2024, bound for Singapore, Indonesia, and Australia. Over Myanmar, the turbulence that had been building throughout the flight turned violent. The plane dropped approximately 6,000 feet in what Kitchen recalls as a sensation of the aircraft plummeting entirely. Objects tumbled from the overhead bins and from passengers' laps—her Kindle, Geoff's phone—and in that moment of free fall, she thought the plane was going down.

Geoff fell forward onto his wife, crushing her against the armrest with his full weight. Other passengers helped move him off her, and a doctor who was traveling on the flight began performing CPR. The aircraft diverted to Bangkok for an emergency landing. Linda was rushed to hospital. Geoff remained on the plane. It would be two days before she learned that her husband, aged 73, had suffered a fatal heart attack triggered by the sudden drop in altitude.

The physical toll on Linda was severe and immediate. She had broken her back in the collision with the armrest. She spent ten days in a Thai hospital before being airlifted back to Bristol, a journey she describes as a blur of pain. Once home in the UK, she remained hospitalized for another week. After discharge, she required substantial assistance with daily living—help that continues to shape her life more than two years later.

Now 74 and living near Thornbury in Bristol, Kitchen has begun legal proceedings at the High Court against Singapore Airlines, seeking damages to help fund the specialist support her injuries demand. Her legal team, led by aviation specialist Anthe Korelidou, frames the case not merely as a claim for compensation but as a vehicle for investigation. The severity of what occurred—a man dead, a woman permanently injured, both from a single event in the sky—raises questions that remain unanswered. Korelidou stated that the family wants the most thorough investigations conducted and seeks to understand whether more could have been done to prevent the injuries that unfolded that day.

Kitchen's own account of the incident carries the weight of someone who has had more than two years to process it. She recalls the earlier turbulence over Europe and across the water, the shaking that made her uneasy but not alarmed. Then came the main event—the sudden, severe drop that felt catastrophic. She watched her husband fall, felt his weight crush her, and in the chaos that followed, was separated from him. "When I got separated from Geoff, I knew he was in a bad way, but nothing prepared me for hearing he had died," she said. "It was absolutely devastating."

The High Court proceedings represent a threshold moment for the family. More than two years have passed since Geoff's death, but the questions remain open. What exactly triggered the turbulence? Were there warnings the crew could have acted on? Could the outcome have been different? The legal action is, in Korelidou's words, a major milestone in the effort to provide Geoff's loved ones with answers they believe they deserve. For Linda, it is also a practical necessity—a way to secure the ongoing care her broken back demands, and perhaps, finally, some clarity about the day that took her husband and changed everything.