Fergie flies high as Andy bails out of public life

WHO WOULD have thought that as the career of former Royal Navy helicopter pilot Prince Andrew crashes and burns, his ex-wife would have the audacity to revisit one of the more colourful chapters of her life?

Sarah, Duchess of York has, I can disclose, spent lockdown preparing to relaunch Budgie The Little Helicopter, the hero of her bestselling children’s books.

‘I’ve never been more proud than today to see my friend Budgie flying to the rescue,’ Fergie tells me.

She already has 45 children’s books to her credit and the Budgie books are in addition to the seven-book deal she signed in February with Serenity Press in Australia.

Proceeds from the new book, Budgie — Turtle Rescue, will be divided between Sarah’s Trust, specifically to help the disabled, and to fight the global battle against plastic.

Sarah wrote her first Budgie story after gaining her helicopter licence. It proved a lucrative creation.

In the mid-1990s, when engulfed by marital troubles and financial difficulties, Budgie helped her fight her way out of the red, courtesy of an ITV adaptation and massive sales of spin-off products from the TV show, particularly in the U.S. Soon afterwards, Sarah cleared her debts — estimated at more than £4 million.

However the uncanny similarity to Arthur W. Baldwin’s 1964 creation Hector The Helicopter prompted the Duchess’s publisher to put out a statement chalking up any similarities to ‘pure coincidence’. The latest chapter in Budgie’s adventures couldn’t have come at a better time. Earlier this year, I revealed that Gate Ventures, the theatre investment company of which Fergie was until recently a director, faced debts of £10.3 million.

Since then, Sarah and Andrew have been sued by French socialite Isabelle de Rouvre for £6.7 million, which, she alleges, remains outstanding from when they bought her alpine chalet in Verbier in 2014.

As one of Fergie’s many friends says: ‘Budgie never gives up — neither does she.’