Recommendation 14

The Department confirmed that there have not been any serious breakdowns at the Weybridge site in recent years. The last major incident was in 2014 when backup generators failed, resulting in a loss of power to some of the high-containment buildings. This could have resulted in an escape of a pathogen. Fortunately, this did not happen.27 However, the Department stated that there is a high likelihood of a major breakdown of the Weybridge site and the Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA) confirmed that the Weybridge site has significant challenges. Both the Department’s and the APHA’s corporate risk registers rate the risk of a major breakdown at Weybridge as very high.28