United Airlines pilot given suspended prison sentence after showing up for flight ‘staggering drunk’

‘His eyes were glassy, and his mouth pasty’

United has told staff they may not drink alcohol 12 hours before a flight (Getty Images)

A United Airlines pilot was handed a six-month suspended prison sentence after he showed up “staggering” drunk despite claiming he had only had two glasses of wine the night before.

The pilot, an American who was identified in the press as Henry W, turned up to Charles De Gaulle airport in Paris, France for a transatlantic flight on Sunday, but police said he was “showing signs of obvious drunkenness”, The Local reported.

“He was staggering slightly, his eyes were glassy, and his mouth pasty,” a police officer told a Paris court on Tuesday after Sunday’s incident.

A blood test showed the 63-year-old pilot was more than six times over the legal alcohol limit for pilots in Europe, and more than three times over the Federal Aviation Authority’s alcohol limit. He was hit with a 4,500 euro fine, a six-month suspended prison sentence and lost his pilot’s licence for a year.

The pilot‘s planned route would have seen him fly 267 passengers to Washington Dulles Airport in Virginia, had he not been prevented from working. However, the pilot claimed that he had had just two glasses of wine the night before.

A French judge told the pilot “there could have been a plane crash — you put 267 passengers at risk”, adding that the testimony of officers made her doubt his claims.

“The safety of our customers and crew is always our top priority. We hold all our employees to the highest standards and have a strict no-tolerance policy for alcohol,” a United Airlines spokesperson said in a statement. “This employee was immediately removed from service and we are fully cooperating with local authorities.”

United has attempted to tackle incidents nvolvcing alcohol and its crew – instructing staff that they must not drink alcohol for 12 hours prior to a flight in what the airline described as its “bottle to throttle” policy.