A HEROINE pilot struggled to control a plane as a drunken Hampshire businessmen risked fellow passengers' lives thousands of feet above the English Channel, a court heard.

A "play-fight" between David Reilly, 40, and another passenger caused the Cessna 421 plane's nose to pitch violently upwards as it returned from a day trip to France, Southampton Crown Court was told.

Prosecutor Sally Halkerston told the jury that control of the plane, which was carrying seven people, was only regained after drastic action by the aerobatically-trained pilot Alison Steel.

"She had to take drastic corrective action to try and regain level flight by using the wing flaps on the plane but to no avail," she said.

"She was forced to cut the power to the engines which eventually brought the nose downwards. Had she not been able to do this the plane would have stalled in mid-air causing it to plummet out of the skies," she added.

But fortunately Miss Steel, who had 20 years' flying experience, was aerobatically trained. A less experienced pilot may not have been able to gain control, the court heard.

"At 5,000ft over the English Channel the consequences could have been disastrous," said Miss Halkerston.

The brawl between Reilly and fellow passenger Brian Harris is alleged to have happened during a 45-minute return corporate flight by Southampton accountants Weeks Green from Southampton International Airport to Deauville, in France, on July 10 last year.

After arm-wrestling the pair began play-fighting, the court heard, and tumbled to the back of the plane causing the plane's centre of gravity to shift backwards and the nose to lift.

Reilly, of Burridge Road, Burridge, near Fareham, was among the three clients invited along for the lunch and had drunk a fair amount of alcohol during the day, the court was told.

He denies endangering an aircraft by recklessly or negligently acting in a manner likely to endanger an aircraft or the people therein and also being drunk on an aircraft.

But the court heard that Reilly, who works for family civil engineering firm John Reilly Partnership in Eastleigh, had been pestering the pilot during the return flight by poking her and at one point grabbing her around the throat. He had also tried to touch the fuel levers of the plane.

Self-employed pilot Alison Steel admitted she was scared by the incident and said she had never to take this kind of corrective action before.

"It was quite difficult to control the plane. If the nose had stayed in this position the aircraft would have stalled. When it stalls the nose drops. We would still have power but the aircraft would be descending at quite a high rate," said Miss Steel.

After gaining control of the plane Miss Steel radioed ahead to the airport to ask for police to meet the plane.

But co-pilot and organiser of the trip Nicholas Parker, a chartered accountant with Weeks Green, said he had witnessed no fighting on the plane but had seen Reilly sprawled over a back seat after the incident.

Proceeding.

Converted for the new archive on 25 January 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.