Pilot wasn’t qualif ied to f ly footballer crash plane
Plane broke up mid-air, as report into Sala tragedy also reveals...
THE pilot of a plane carrying footballer Emiliano Sala was not qualified to fly the aircraft and was disorientated by a carbon monoxide leak when it plunged into the sea, a report revealed yesterday.
David Ibbotson, 59, was sufficiently conscious to try to pull the plane up from a dive, but it was going too fast and broke up in mid-air.
His ability to fly the single-engine Piper Malibu aircraft would have been severely affected by CO poisoning.
But accident investigators concluded his lack of training in night flying and recent lack of practice in flying using the plane’s instruments rather than sight increased the risk of him losing control.
The poisonous gas leak was so bad that tests of Mr Sala’s body showed he would have been ‘deeply unconscious’ by the time the plane hit the water.
Mr Ibbotson’s body has not been found, but he will also have been badly impaired by the ‘silent killer’ gas, probably resulting from exhaust gases leaking into the cabin via the heating system. Damage to a tailpipe during the flight was probably the cause, according to the report by the Air Accidents Investigation Branch.
There was no CO monitor in the plane and the report’s authors have recommended that a gas monitor with an alarm, which cost as little as €16.50, must be installed in all aircraft of this design so pilots can take quick action before they are rendered senseless.
Argentinian striker Sala, 28, had just completed a €16.5 million transfer from French club Nantes to Cardiff City and was being flown to the UK from France when the accident happened in bad weather in January last year.
He was the only passenger in the private aircraft flown by Mr Ibbotson, a pilot highly experienced in parachute drops, when it crashed into the English Channel 35km from Guernsey.
The report concluded that Mr Ibbotson was ‘not qualified to fly the aircraft at the time of the accident’. He was expecting to be paid for taking the footballer to Cardiff but was not licensed for commercial trips.
AAIB investigators found he ‘had been paid a fee for flights on numerous occasions’.
The pilot should also not have been flying at night. The report stated: ‘It is likely that the pilot felt some pressure to complete the return leg of the flight even though it would be at night and in poor weather.’
Although maintenance of the aircraft was up to date, the autopilot had an ‘intermittent fault’, the report revealed. And on the flight to France two days earlier, Mr Ibbotson reported hearing a ‘bang’ and a low-level mist through the aircraft. Investigators couldn’t find out if this mystery incident was linked in any way to the accident but three other technical issues on the earlier trip were ruled as irrelevant.
David Henderson, 65, an experienced pilot who was reportedly due to fly the plane was arrested last June on suspicion of manslaughter. UK Police announced this week he would not be charged.