Granddaughter of couple who died of carbon monoxide poisoning in Egypt after room next door was fumigated for bedbugs ‘felt sick’ after noticing a ‘disgusting smell’ hours before the horror discovery

The granddaughter of a British couple who died from carbon monoxide poisoning at an Egyptian hotel after bed bug spray was used said she noticed a ‘disgusting smell’ hours before the horror discovery.   

John Cooper, 69, and his wife, Susan, 63, from Burnley in Lancashire, had been enjoying a ‘brilliant’ holiday while staying at the Steigenberger Aqua Magic Hotel in the Red Sea resort of Hurghada in 2018, when they suddenly fell ill and died. 

An inquest into the couple’s deaths confirmed the pair were killed by carbon monoxide poisoning caused by fumes from a pesticide used in the room next door – which had an adjoining locked door.

The couple had been sharing the luxury suite with granddaughter Molly, then 12 now 18. Speaking to the Mirror, Molly’s mother Kelly Ormerod said a ‘disgusting smell’ prompted her daughter to move rooms hours before the tragedy.

‘I thought Molly had eaten something funny. She looked peaky but said the smell of my mum and dad’s room was making her feel sick,’ said Kelly, who said her father looked ‘fine’ when he walked Molly to her mother’s room. 

John Cooper, 69, and his wife Susan, 63, pictured outside another hotel, died from carbon monoxide poisoning in August 2018 

Daughter Kelly Ormerod (right) with mum Susan and dad John

Kelly  was left heartbroken by the loss of her parents during the holiday tragedy 

The next day, Kelly found her parents desperately unwell when she visited their room. When her father opened the door, he was ‘incredibly unsteady on his feet’, ‘slurring his words’, and ‘zig zagging across the room’.

READ MORE: Husband and wife enjoying ‘brilliant’ holiday in Egypt died of carbon monoxide poisoning after room next door was fumigated for bedbugs – as their heartbroken daughter says tragedy ‘should never have happened’

Meanwhile, her mother was in bed caked in vomit. Horrified Kelly and family friend Louise Clayton, 58, asked the hotel for a doctor, who took an ‘hour’ to arrive. During which time, her parents’ condition has deteriorated, with her father unable to move or talk and her mother groaning in pain. The couple later died from poisoning. 

Speaking out today, single mother-of-three Kelly, 46, said the deaths of her parents still haunted her. 

‘I still suffer from the trauma of seeing them die in such a dreadful way. Our family is broken without them. I’m still in so much pain over the thought their deaths could have been prevented but I’m glad we now finally have the answers,’ she told the Mirror.

Kelly, who described her parents as fit and healthy for their age, had been on holiday with them, their three grandchildren and family friends.

But around lunchtime on the eighth day into their holiday, the room next to the Coopers – which had an adjoining locked door – was fumigated with pesticide, known as Lambda, for a bed bug infestation.

The pesticide was diluted with dichloromethane, which produces carbon monoxide when broken down by the body. It was banned except for limited industrial use by the UK and European Union in 2010 and the US is due to ban it next year. 

The room next to the Coopers was sealed with masking tape around the door, the inquest heard. Hours later the couple returned to their room for the night. 

Kelly Ormerod, the Coopers’ daughter, speaks to Press outside Preston Coroner’s Court 

Their granddaughter Molly, who was staying on a single bed in the couple’s room, began to feel ill. And in the early hours Mr Cooper escorted her to the room of Ms Ormerod, her mother – in a move which might have saved her life.

The following morning mother of three Ms Ormerod went knocking after her parents failed to come down to breakfast.

Full statement from couple’s heartbroken daughter outside court

Kelly Ormerod, the Coopers’ daughter, spoke outside Preston Coroner’s Court.

She said: ‘After more than five years of waiting, we’ve finally been given some closure around the deaths of mum and dad.

‘However, whatever the outcome today was, nothing would ever make up for the pain and loss we’ve felt since that day.

‘We’d all been looking forward to our family holiday and being able to spend quality time together. We were then faced with total heartbreak.

‘Our family still struggle to comprehend what we went through that day and feel like it should never have happened. The last few years have been the most traumatic time for all of us.

‘While time has moved on, it’s stood still for our family because of the many unanswered questions we’d had.

‘There’s now a huge void in our lives and I don’t think our family will ever fully come to terms with losing mum and dad the way we did. They were both fit and healthy, and to not know how they died has been extremely difficult.

‘Having to relive everything at the inquest has been harrowing but it was something we had to do for mum and dad. We’d do anything to have them back in our lives but we take some small comfort from at least having the answers we deserve. We now need to try and come to terms with everything. Our family is broken without them.’

She found both her father, a builder, and mother, a cashier in a Thomas Cook bureau de change, seriously ill. Her father was declared dead in the room and her mother hours later in hospital.

Dr James Adeley, senior coroner for Lancashire sitting at Preston Coroner’s Court, ruled that the deaths on August 21, 2018 were caused by the spraying of the pesticide containing dichloromethane, in the adjoining room and the couple then inhaling the vapour resulting in their deaths from carbon monoxide poisoning.

He said the spraying had created sufficient vapour to pass under the adjoining door and poison the couple.

Outside the coroner’s court, Ms Ormerod said: ‘After more than five years of waiting, we’ve finally been given some closure around the deaths of mum and dad.

‘However, whatever the outcome today was, nothing would ever make up for the pain and loss we’ve felt since that day.

‘We’d all been looking forward to our family holiday and being able to spend quality time together. We were then faced with total heartbreak.

‘Our family still struggle to comprehend what we went through that day and feel like it should never have happened. The last few years have been the most traumatic time for all of us.

‘While time has moved on, it’s stood still for our family because of the many unanswered questions we’d had.

‘There’s now a huge void in our lives and I don’t think our family will ever fully come to terms with losing mum and dad the way we did. They were both fit and healthy, and to not know how they died has been extremely difficult.

‘Having to relive everything at the inquest has been harrowing but it was something we had to do for mum and dad. We’d do anything to have them back in our lives but we take some small comfort from at least having the answers we deserve. We now need to try and come to terms with everything. Our family is broken without them.’

Jatinder Paul, a lawyer from Irwin Mitchell, representing the family, added: ‘To find out that the couple died from a pesticide that had been sprayed in an adjoining room, leading to carbon monoxide poisoning, is shocking and deeply concerning.

‘It’s now vital that lessons are learned to ensure a tragedy like this doesn’t happen to future holidaymakers.’

Earlier, the three-day inquest heard from toxicology expert Professor Robert Chilcott.

The expert told the hearing that carbon monoxide was present in the blood samples from the bodies of the couple but he could not be certain of the levels.

John and Susan Cooper were described during the inquest as fit and healthy for their age

Kelly Ormerod makes a statement to the media outside Preston Coroner’s Court 

However, he said the levels were sufficient to suggest ‘severe exposure’.

READ MORE Panic as bedbugs found crawling in the soft furnishings at west London library forcing elderly people and children to be evacuated

Professor Chilcott said in less developed countries the pesticide Lambda is sometimes diluted with another substance, dichloromethane, which causes the body to metabolise or ingest carbon monoxide.

He added: ‘I would say a ten-hour exposure duration, in theory, would be sufficient to cause carbon monoxide poisoning.’

Dr Adeley asked about the toxicity of dichloromethane, compared with other substances, adding, ‘a quick brush with Novichok and you are dead’.

He asked: ‘Is the volume of spray you would be using enough to create carbon monoxide?’

Professor Chilcott replied: ‘In theory, yes. There are occupational limits about how much you are able to inhale.’

He said the rules in the UK are 100 parts per million over an eight-hour exposure.

He said spraying it – as in the hotel room – it would ‘rapidly exceed’ the UK exposure limits.

Home Office pathologist Dr Charles Wilson gave a cause of death for Mr Cooper as carbon monoxide toxicity and heart disease and for Mrs Cooper, carbon monoxide toxicity.

Dr Wilson said: ‘What you have here is a situation whereby the trajectory of the Coopers’ deaths, the circumstances surrounding it, how that evolved is not compatible with natural disease.

‘It is typical of something in the environment and carbon monoxide is a common environmental toxin. It shows lots of features I would expect to see in carbon monoxide poisoning.

‘It’s exactly what I would expect to see in people poisoned by carbon monoxide.’

The couple died during their stay at the Steigenberger Aqua Magic Hotel in Hurghada, Egypt

Dr Wilson added that someone with cardiovascular disease, like Mr Cooper, would find it more difficult to withstand carbon monoxide poisoning.

And Dr Nick Gent, a former senior medical adviser to Public Health England, said he agreed on the presence of carbon monoxide in the Coopers’ blood.

But he described the theory of dichloromethane as the source an ‘interesting hypothesis’.

Dr Adeley asked: ‘In terms of the source of the carbon monoxide. Where has it come from?’

Dr Gent replied: ‘I have no idea sir. I have looked at the documentation to identify the likely or even possible source.’

Dr Adeley continued: ‘We are down to Sherlock Holmes, once you have excluded everything else, what you have left is the truth.’

Dr Gent said: ‘I can’t help further with the source of carbon monoxide. I can’t go further on the source without being able to re-examine the premises at the time the deaths occurred.’

Earlier Ms Ormerod, the Coopers’ daughter and a civil servant with HMRC, described her parents as fit and healthy for their age and said they had been enjoying a ‘brilliant’ holiday with her, their three grandchildren and family friends, after leaving the UK on August 13, 2018.

Her mother had been to the same hotel in April that year and described it as ‘fabulous’, and decided to go back with the whole family.

On the evening of August 20 they all went to the hotel restaurant and a bar, before retiring for the evening.

Ms Ormerod’s daughter, Molly, then aged 12, was staying on a single bed in her grandparents’ room, which she said had a ‘yeasty smell’. 

But at 1am Mr Cooper rang to say she was feeling a little unwell and he escorted his granddaughter to her mother’s room in an upper floor.

The next morning, Mr and Mrs Cooper failed to emerge for breakfast, so Ms Ormerod went to their ground floor room, 5107, to discover the pair were seriously ill.

Ms Ormerod said her father came to the door saying: ‘I really don’t feel very well,’ with him retching and screwing his face up.

Susan Cooper had been to the same hotel in April that year and described it as ‘fabulous’

‘He just literally slumped and sat on the corner of the bed and said: “I’m really not well,” Ms Ormerod told the hearing.

She said her mother was in bed, ‘groaning’, with vomit in her hair and around the room, where she noticed a strange ‘heavy’ smell.

Two doctors were summoned but they were in ‘panic mode’, Ms Ormerod said, as her parents further deteriorated and her father struggled to breathe.

Tearfully, Ms Ormerod added: ‘His eyes kind of… a glazed, staring look.’

CPR was attempted but Mr Cooper was declared dead on the hotel room floor and his wife was taken to a clinic at the hotel where she became ‘super agitated’ and delirious, the inquest heard.

Mrs Cooper was taken to hospital by ambulance but declared dead at 4.12pm.

Kelly Ormerod, the Coopers’ daughter, with her mother Susan 

Both were returned to the UK in sealed, zinc-lined coffins, the inquest heard.

A statement was also read from Dominik Bibi, a truck despatcher from Germany, who arrived with seven family members in the early hours of August 20.

Mr Bibi said his mother-in-law, who used a wheelchair, was booked to stay in room 5106, the ground-floor room next to the Coopers’ room.

His statement added: ‘On entering I immediately noticed a funny smell, like that of mould or damp. There was a lot of bed bugs in the bed and under it.’

He said a cleaner and night manager came to apologise and his mother-in-law took his and his wife’s room, further down the corridor at 5102.

Hours later, around lunchtime, he was outside her room when he saw three men, two wearing the hotel uniform and the other with a two or three-litre pesticide canister he assumed being used to get rid of the bed bugs.

Ms Ormerod at Preston Coroner’s Court this morning. She said: ‘Having to relive everything at the inquest has been harrowing but it was something we had to do for mum and dad’

After five or 10 minutes they left the room and used masking tape to tape up around the door and seal the room.

‘I would not say the job was very professional,’ Mr Bibi’s statement continued.

He said that day, the air conditioning in the hotel was not working and a cleaner told the family the hotel was undertaking maintenance on the system.

He said he himself and other members of his family were unwell, but he expected that during a holiday.

The inquest, five years after the deaths, also heard of multiple, repeated attempts to obtain more documents and information from the authorities in Egypt despite numerous requests from the Foreign Office.

Coroner Dr Adeley said Mr Cooper’s illness and death was rapid, but described the medical treatment provided for Mrs Cooper as ‘utterly insufficient’ after she was taken to a clinic in the hotel before an ambulance was called, creating a delay of four hours before she got to hospital.

The German-owned hotel chain has been contacted for comment.

Mr Adeley said: ‘For deaths such as John and Susan Cooper to occur in a foreign country and move with such rapidity over a short period of time from good health to death is frightening. However, in this case, for their family and friends (who tried to help the stricken couple) to have to watch them die would have been a truly terrible experience.’ 

The inquest came amid a present-day rise in bed bugs which experts say could be due to the increase in travel after the Covid-19 lockdowns. 

Data released by pest-control company Rentokil in September showed that from 2022 to 2023, the UK saw a 65 per cent increase in bed bug infestations.

Experts have warned bed bugs had largely disappeared from daily life in developed countries by the 1950s but have made a return in the past 30 years.

The causes include growing resistance to insecticides, an increase in public travel and a rising proclivity for second-hand goods.

Source: Read Full Article