Montreal Convention

The Montreal Convention 1999 sets the framework of liability that applies when something goes wrong on an international flight — death or injury to a passenger, loss of or damage to baggage or cargo, or delay. It was given domestic effect in the UK through Schedule 1B of the Carriage by Air Act 1961, inserted by statutory order, which reproduces the Convention's substantive provisions on carrier liability for the rights and obligations of carriers, passengers, consignors and consignees.

Article 17 of the Convention fixes the carrier's liability for passenger injury to accidents occurring 'on board the aircraft or in the course of any of the operations of embarking or disembarking' — an accident that happens before boarding starts or well after disembarking is complete generally falls outside the Convention's scope. For checked baggage, liability similarly attaches only to damage occurring 'on board the aircraft or during any period within which the checked baggage was in the charge of the carrier.'

For delay, Article 19 makes the carrier liable for 'damage occasioned by delay in the carriage by air of passengers, baggage or cargo', but allows the carrier to escape liability if it can show that it and its agents 'took all measures that could reasonably be required to avoid the damage.' Article 22 then caps the carrier's financial exposure with specific limits expressed in Special Drawing Rights — for example, a defined per-passenger limit for delay and a per-kilogram limit for cargo — though these caps fall away entirely where the loss results from the intentional or reckless conduct of the carrier's own staff.