Owner of the plane in which Emiliano Sala died banned flights for the pilot involved in the accident

The owner of the small private plane in which Argentine football player Emiliano Sala was traveling when he died in a plane crash in January 2019, assured the United Kingdom Justice on Wednesday (20) that she had expressly prohibited the use of the pilot. involved in the fatal incident.

The person responsible for coordinating the operation of the aircraft, David Henderson, 67, is being tried in a court in Cardiff, Wales, for recklessness or negligence likely to endanger the flight that took the 28-year-old attacker to be. incorporated into the cast of Cardiff City, the club that had just signed him for 17 million euros (R$ 73.1 million at the price at the time).

He is also charged with trying to transport a passenger without a valid authorization, a charge he has already pleaded guilty to and therefore will not be addressed during the two-week trial that began Monday.

In the dark of night and with complicated weather conditions, the small private plane, a Piper PA-46 Malibu, crashed into English Channel waters on January 21, 2019.

Sala’s body, whose death caused a stir in the football world, was found in what was left of the aircraft’s fuselage more than two weeks after the accident, at a depth of 67 meters. On the other hand, the body of the pilot, 59-year-old David Ibbotson, was never located.

This Wednesday (20), the owner of the plane, Fay Keely, explained in court that she bought the aircraft on the advice of Henderson and allowed him to operate it and choose the pilots.

However, she assured that on July 6, 2018, almost seven months before the accident, she sent her an email with instructions not to use Ibbotson again after the UK civil aviation authority reported two infractions. .

“Without my permission”

Keely later discovered that, despite everything, Henderson had turned to this pilot again in August 2018.

On the day of the accident, “himself [Henderson] should have flown the plane,” he explained.

“Then I found out that he wasn’t available and that I had asked David Ibbotson to fly in his place. […] without my permission,” he added.

Yesterday, the prosecutor accused Henderson of favoring his economic interest over safety by hiring a pilot he knew was unqualified.

“Ibbotson did not have a commercial pilot’s license, his license for aircraft type N264DB had expired in November 2018, and he was not competent to fly in the weather that Henderson knew the flight would encounter,” said promoter Martin Goudie.

Sala died on his way back to Cardiff from the French city of Nantes, where he had played until then and where he had gone to collect his belongings and to say goodbye to his fellow club members before starting training with his new team.

The British Air Accident Investigation Agency (AAIB) determined in a report published in March 2020 that the pilot lost control of the aircraft during a maneuver performed at very high speed, “probably” to avoid the bad weather.

The small plane allegedly sustained damage during the maneuver, and investigators believe the pilot and passenger “probably” passed out after intoxicating themselves with carbon monoxide from the engine’s exhaust system.