An emergency slide on a British Airways flight was accidentally activated in an incident reported to have cost the airline £100,000. 

The Boeing 787-10 Dreamliner (G-ZBLA) was set to fly from Montreal to London Heathrow on Saturday.

However, the evacuation slide was mistakenly deployed and appears to have inflated out of the left-hand side of the aircraft onto a catering vehicle parked next to the plane. 

The flight was delayed as ground and maintenance staff handled the issue, according to FL360aero. 

The slide had to be inspected thoroughly before being repacked into the plane or completely replaced. 

In the end, the aircraft arrived in London two hours and 30 minutes late, going on to set back a flight it was scheduled to operate to Newark. 

It has been reported previously that such accidents can cost the airline a whopping £100,000.

A spokesman for British Airways said: 'We have apologised to customers for the delay to their journey. Our teams worked hard to get them on their way as quickly as possible.' 

A similar incident played out earlier this year, when passengers aboard a British Airways flight were forced to wait three hours on the tarmac after a crew member accidentally activated the plane's emergency slide. 

The mistake happened 'just seconds' before the flight from Heathrow to Washington DC was scheduled to depart.

The plane, which had approximately 336 passengers aboard, was then attended to by emergency services as travellers were left stuck to their seats for an extra three hours. 

The incident has been described as a 'brainless act' by a source that spoke to The Sun. 

They said: 'Just seconds from take-off, a BA crew member accidentally popped the door and deployed the emergency slide.

'It was a brainless act, which delayed the flight for three hours and cost around £100,000.

'Passengers eventually had to exit the plane.'

Last year, a BA staff member activated the emergency slide on a flight from Heathrow to Brussels – leaving the Airbus A321 flight grounded and eventually cancelled. 

Travellers endured a similar three-hour wait, while another plane was sourced to take them on a one-hour 15-minute flight to Belgium. 

Emergency services attended the scene as a precautionary measure. 

And in February 2024, a BA captain made a similar mistake – activating the emergency slide on a flight to Romania moments before take-off. 

The pilot allegedly failed to disarm the plane door when he opened it to pass documents to members of the crew.

This resulted in a lengthy delay for passengers aboard the BA886 flight and cost the airline £50,000. 

A spokesman for British Airways said at the time: 'We have apologised to customers for the delay to their journey. Our teams worked hard to get them on their way as quickly as possible.'