Crash pilot ‘should have landed sooner’

Friday 7th April 2006, 12:00AM BST.

THE pilot of an aircraft that made an emergency landing in Jersey last August missing five feet of wing and a fuel tank should have diverted to another airfield earlier, an inquiry has concluded.

The report by Irish air accident investigators states that the pilot thought that the plane had been hit by a bird after take-off but had had actually struck a tree.

The 49-year-old pilot of the Cessna P210N, registration N6593W, was taking three passengers to Lisbon on a flight that took off from Brittas House airfield in Limerick on 12 August last year.

The accident investigation report said that shortly after take-off from the private grass airfield, all four people on board heard a ‘thump’.

‘Following some troubleshooting, the pilot concluded that the aircraft had suffered a bird strike and subsequently reported this to Shannon Air Traffic Control.

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