A 49-year-old Frenchman was handed 12-month suspended prison sentence after he admitted that taking ecstasy caused him trouble in landing a plane in Paris.
The man was caught out after police tapped phone conversations of members in a Paris drug ring, one of whom was speaking to the pilot.
The pilot recounted his troubles landing a plane at Paris airport Orly in May this year, the day after he had taken a third of an ecstasy pill.
“I had the sweats, I wasn’t feeling well. I was just doing any old thing as we came in for landing,” police heard the man say on the phone.
The Créteil criminal court on Friday banned the man from piloting and handed him a 12-month suspended prison sentence.
In court, the pilot said his actions were an “inexcusable error” adding that he had been “confident that the side effects of the drug would disappear after two hours”.
He added that he usually left it “two or three days” before flying after taking illicit substances, which he admitted also included cocaine and cannabis.
The father of three said that his drug habit had been going for around 18 months on “nights out in Paris”.
The prosecutor noted that the man was suffering from an addiction.
“You were not in the same physical shape as a pilot who had not consumed anything,” the prosecutor said.
EasyJet said in a statement that the pilot had been removed from service when the police investigation was launched and that disciplinary proceedings were underway.
“The safety of passengers and the crew of EasyJet is our number one priority and we have a zero tolerance approach to drugs and alcohol,” the airline said.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk
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