PIA pilot jailed for nine months in Britain. PHOTO: AFP/FILE
A Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) pilot was jailed for nine months in Britain on Friday for being drunk before he was due to fly a plane with 156 people on board.
Irfan Faiz, 55, was asked to leave the cockpit during checks for the flight from Leeds Bradford airport to Islamabad on September 18 because he smelled of alcohol and was unsteady on his feet.
The father-of-two was found to have three times the legal amount of alcohol in his blood; prosecutors told the court in Leeds in northern England.
Faiz told police he had drunk three-quarters of a bottle of whisky but had stopped drinking some 19 hours ahead of the planned take-off of the Airbus 310.
His behaviour would have been permitted in Pakistan, where the rules state only that there should be 12 hours between “bottle and throttle” no matter how much the pilot had drunk, the court heard.
Judge Peter Coulson described this rule as “extraordinary” and said he was also “astonished” to hear that pilots regularly flying out of Britain did not know about the far stricter regulations there.
In Britain, pilots are permitted nine microgrammes in 100 millilitres of breath tested, well below the 35 microgrammes allowed to drive a car. Faiz initially gave a reading of 41 but a later test recorded 28.
At the time of the incident, Pakistan’s national carrier said the drunk pilot would be sacked if he was convicted.
Published in The Express Tribune, November 23rd, 2013.
COMMENTS (18)
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@Asif: He is the son of a former general, even if he is sacked, he will find his way back in PIA
Shame on you mr pilot (soon be an ex pilot) for being a so called muslim. How you will explain this to your two kids after your sentence? Or you even not bothered?
Lets not forget that this drunk individual is the son of Lt. Gen Chishti Corps Commander Rawalpindi in 1977 and therefore the one who actually ordered troops to overthrow the elected government in Pakistan and put Gen. Zia (the root of the problem of armed mullahism in Pakistan) in power. The more the talk about Islam, the more corrupt and hypocritical they are.
Now that he has got the necessary qualification, he will be made MD of PIA after his release.
I pray for one day when when I read something that does not make me feel ashamed for being Pakistani.
Well if you ask me then i would consider UK authorities to be incompetent because they only tested the guy for alcohol!
I am surprised he saying his actions are permitted in pakistan. He is muslim and drinking alcohol which is crime in pakistani law.
It is matter of shame still no action from PIA or pakistani government is taken despite he is punished by international law; he at least should not be allowed to fly again!!
Drunk Generals destroyed Pakistan.
Drunk Pilots destroing Pakistan International Airlines.
PIA, like other government organizations, is effected by the plague of PPP's corrupt cronyism. Those bloodsuckers have not only inducted thousands of jiyalas in these organizations but also took these companies to new heights of mega corruption. Resultantly, these organizations (PSEs) have become not only financially but also morally bankrupt. They are a burden on taxpayer money by taking bailouts for their survival every year. PIA is incurring a loss of Rs 36 Billion every year (Rs 10 crores daily) since these people consider PIA as their personal fiefdom without even caring about the reputation of national institution or the bailouts these vultures are eating away from taxpayer money!
Isn't he the son of Gen Chishti, a rafiq of Islamist Gen Zia?
Please Imbibe Alochol
It's his bad luck he got caught in UK. If it had been Pakistan, firstly he would never have been caught. Secondly, even if he had, he would still have gone on to fly the plane.
Let's see if PIA management has the balls to sack him, as they have stated earlier.
And this episode also has exposed this hilarious point: the Islamic Republic of Pakistan has a higher tolerance for alcohol than the decadent western nation of Great Britain i.e. you can drink as much as you want as long as you do it 12 hours before flight. This implies that you can still have a lot of alcohol in your system when you get into the cockpit in Pakistan than in UK. So you can be legally drunk in UK by having a lower alcohol blood count than in Pakistan.You couldn't make this up. Only in Pakistan.
Actually, I was surprised that Pakistan even had a rule for drinking and flying, even if it was just a rule of thumb.. Perhaps a law of automatic dismissal if caught drunk is what is needed to fix PALPA.
Justice UK style...... a drunk punished for his crime. Justice Pakistani style..........murderer of Shahzeb Khan still to be punished though guilty.
Has been sacked?? About time to fold the pilots breaking the law or fold up the airline that puts passengers security at risk.
Rules in Pakistan are that a Muslim cannot even drink alcohol, let alone a 12 hour gap between bottle & throttle.
He should be sacked immediately!!
"that there should be 12 hours between “bottle and throttle” no matter how much the pilot had drunk" .... in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. Something does not fit.
It has been reported that he was not only drunk but was also singing Love Songs. Shame on this pilot and if he is Muslim (looks from his name) then penalize him according to Sharia Laws after his return from 9 months in the stomach of Jail. Time and again stories of PIA staff appears in the news which hurts us being a citizen of Pakistan.
Bravo! Viva! Shabash! British courts are not afraid to do justice. Salams