{"id":138288,"date":"2023-09-28T12:28:44","date_gmt":"2023-09-28T12:28:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/magdelaine.net\/?p=138288"},"modified":"2023-09-28T12:28:44","modified_gmt":"2023-09-28T12:28:44","slug":"ba-captain-speaks-of-disgust-over-cocaine-snorting-pilot-mike-beaton","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/magdelaine.net\/lifestyle\/ba-captain-speaks-of-disgust-over-cocaine-snorting-pilot-mike-beaton\/","title":{"rendered":"BA captain speaks of disgust over 'cocaine-snorting' pilot Mike Beaton"},"content":{"rendered":"
A pilot at British Airways has spoken of the disgust felt among flight crews at the airline over the behaviour of Mike Beaton.<\/p>\n
Beaton, a first officer, was sacked after he bragged to colleagues about snorting cocaine off a woman’s bare breasts in South Africa before trying to fly a packed plane back to the UK.<\/p>\n
A BA captain, speaking anonymously, told MailOnline Travel: ‘Talking to pilot colleagues, we feel hugely let down by this individual.’<\/p>\n
When asked how common it was for a pilot to be affected by alcohol in the cockpit, he replied: ‘It’s beyond rare. Unthinkable.’<\/p>\n
British Airways has told its staff to report any concerns they have about senior colleagues taking drugs after Beaton’s wrongdoing, according to The Sun.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
First Officer Mike Beaton was sacked by British Airways after a night of debauchery in South Africa<\/p>\n
Beaton was reported to management at BA after he sent text messages to a stewardess bragging about how he had been ‘very, very naughty’ with two women and two men in Johannesburg.<\/p>\n
The father-of-one told how the group ‘did shots, polished off a bottle of vodka’, then how he ‘snorted cocaine off a topless woman’s t***’ and then ‘s*****d for ages’ before trying to fly a plane back to London.<\/p>\n
‘[I] was so f****d I couldn’t even lift my head until gone 2,’ Beaton wrote.<\/p>\n
It is a remarkable fall from grace for Beaton, who lives in an idyllic \u00a3750,000 home in Devon with his Polish wife and their five-year-old daughter.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The bragging text messages sent by Mr Beaton to a stewardess about his sordid evening in Johannesburg<\/p>\n
They run a luxury treehouse retreat business together called Happy Owls, which featured in The Times top 12 treehouse hotels this year.<\/p>\n
Beaton’s mother served as an officer in the RAF and has sat as a magistrate in Peterborough since 2005.<\/p>\n
She lives with the disgraced pilot’s stepfather, an RAF pilot who flew every member of the Royal Family in a career that saw him invested as a Member of the Royal Victorian Order.<\/p>\n
Instances of pilots being drunk before taking the controls are extremely rare, as our pilot source stated.<\/p>\n
One serious incident involving BA crew took place in 2000, when a Channel 4 Dispatches documentary caught a captain, Chris Salmon, and a first officer, James Sharples, drinking heavily in Barcelona before a flight to Gatwick.<\/p>\n
Salmon was alleged to have drunk seven bottles of beer and more than a bottle of wine the night before the flight, reported The Times, while Sharples, it was claimed, drunk ‘at least eight pints of beer’.<\/p>\n
Salmon was heard saying ‘I can’t believe I’ve got to take an aircraft back’.<\/p>\n
After the expose, The Times notes, Salmon resigned and Sharples was sacked.<\/p>\n
British Airways told MailOnline after Beaton was fired: ‘Safety is always our top priority. The matter was referred to the CAA and this individual no longer works for us.’<\/p>\n