A judge was correct to find that damage caused by the detonation of an 79-year-old German bomb was the fault of the Luftwaffe and not a 2021 bomb disposal squad, the Court of Appeal has ruled. In University of Exeter v Allianz Insurance plc, three judges led by Lord Justice Coulson dismissed an appeal by the University of Exeter against a High Court ruling earlier this year over a denied insurance claim for damage caused.
The claim followed the detonation of a 1,000kg bomb which had been dropped in 1942 during the so-called 'Baedeker raids' on British cities. It was discovered during building work in 2021 and tackled on-site by a team from the Royal Logistics Corps: an intended 'low order' explosion became high order when 630kg of high explosive went up.
The university claimed on its insurance for physical damage to halls of residence - which were not even built when the bomb was dropped - and business interruption. Insurer Allianz declined the claim because of a clause denying liability for loss occasioned by war. Earlier this year, the High Court agreed with the insurer.
The university's appeal centred on the judge's finding that the dropping of the bomb was the sole 'proximate cause' of the loss. David Pliener KC, for the university, argued that the attempted controlled detonation was a more potent cause of the damage. This was first, because of the passage of time and, secondly, because of the bomb disposal methdology. However the judge found that the 'proximate cause' is not necessarily the cause closest in time to the loss 'on the contrary, it can often be the first in time'. Meanwhile, the decisions taken on making the bomb safe could not be relevant to causation unless there was an act of negligence, which was not the case.
Concludiung that both the dropping of the bomb and its detonation were causes of the damage, the judge described the arguments seeking to exclude the dropping of the bomb as 'artificial'. While it was 'not easy to identify any directly analogous cases', he relied on the 1974 decision in Wayne Pump to rule that, where there are two causes of loss and one is insured and the other is not, 'the exclusion will generally prevail'. The claim must therefore fail.
Lord Justice Snowden and Lord Justice Lewison agreed.
Introducing the 17 page judgment, Coulson thanked both sides for refraining from the 'incontinent citation of numerous vaguely relevant causation authorities, all too common in appeals of this type'.
David Pliener KC, instructed by DAC Beachcroft LLP, appeared for the university; Isabel Hitching KC, instructed by Fenchurch Law Ltd, for the insurer.
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