The “seeds of disaster” were sown at Sheffield Wednesday’s Hillsborough football ground 10 years before 96 people were killed at a 1989 FA Cup semi-final, a court has been told.
John Cutlack, a structural engineer with 40 years’ experience of working on sports grounds, said the most significant error made by the club’s engineers, Eastwood & Partners, was “a gross over-estimate” of the safe capacity on the Leppings Lane terrace.
The figure of 7,200, which was sanctioned and stated on the club’s safety certificate in 1979, and never amended throughout the decade before lethal overcrowding caused the deaths on that terrace, was 1,774 more than the total safe capacity calculated by Cutlack, of 5,426.
He agreed with Jason Beer QC, representing Graham Mackrell, Sheffield Wednesday’s club secretary and safety officer at the time of the disaster, that the over-calculation was a “really big error” by the firm, which was headed by a distinguished engineer, Dr Wilfred Eastwood.
“The seeds of the disaster were sown by Dr Eastwood’s calculations here,” Beer said. “In short it was the firm that sowed that seed, wasn’t it?”
“Yes,” Cutlack replied.
Eastwood’s failing, which undermined the safety of the Leppings Lane end where the lethal crush happened in 1989, was “remarkable” and “fundamental”, Cutlack said. It was compounded by other failings, including having insufficient turnstiles at that end, and flaws in the crush barrier system, he said.
Mackrell is charged with two criminal offences relating to his duties as the club’s safety officer for the 1989 semi-final between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest, including an alleged failure to agree with police a change to the turnstile arrangements from those for the semi-final between the same two clubs the previous year.
The second charge is that he breached the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 by failing to ensure the number of turnstiles was sufficient to prevent unduly large crowds building up, and failing to draw up contingency plans to cope if that did happen.
David Duckenfield, the South Yorkshire police chief superintendent who commanded the 1989 FA Cup match, is standing trial, alongside Mackrell at Preston crown court, charged with gross negligence manslaughter in relation to the deaths.
Cutlack agreed with Ben Myers QC, representing Duckenfield, that the availability of only seven turnstiles for 10,100 people with standing tickets to support Liverpool at the Leppings Lane end was “an insufficient number to prevent a build up of a crowd outside the ground”.
At the 1988 semi-final, he confirmed, 13 turnstiles were used, for those 10,100, and 4,465 people with tickets for the West Stand seats above the terrace.
Cutlack also agreed that several elements at the Leppings Lane end were below standard:
• Signs above the turnstiles were “confusing” for supporters and did not correspond to the layout depicted on their tickets.
• The tunnel leading to “pens” 3 and 4 of the terrace “should have been manned to ensure overcrowding did not occur”.
• Its downward slope was “irregular and in places it was too steep”.
• Spans in two crush barriers should not have been removed, because that increased the downward pressure of a crowd surge.
• Four of the crush barriers were “significantly” lower than the recommended heights in the official “green guide” to safety at sports grounds, which also increased the downward pressure, and three were too high.
• The gates in the high metal fence at the front of the terrace, which opened on to the pitch perimeter, were 30% narrower than the green guide recommended width, so did not allow proper emergency access, and the steps up to the gates within the terrace were “irregular” and too high.
Cutlack said Eastwood’s initial failing, overcalculating the terrace capacity, was followed by failures to review and amend the capacity when the terrace was divided into the pens in 1981, then further divided in 1985, and when the crush barrier spans were removed in 1986.
The judge, Sir Peter Openshaw, gave legal guidance to the jury of six men and six women, reminding them that Mackrell is charged with “very specific and narrow offences”.
He told them: “Those charges do not concern the broader matters relevant to safety at Hillsborough, nor the criticism of the club more generally.”
Both Mackrell and Duckenfield have pleaded not guilty to the charges.
The trial continues.
