A Japanese pilot has admitted to being almost ten times over the legal drinking limit for commericial pilots less than an hour before he was due to pilot a flight from London Heathrow to Tokyo.
A crew bus driver contacted police after he smelt alcohol on the pilot, identified as 42-year-old Japan Airlines officer Katsutoshi Jitsukawa.
When police arrived, 50 minutes before take-off, Jitsukawa was already in the cockpit of the 244-seat Boeing 777. A breathalyser found that he had 189 mg of alcohol per 100 ml of blood in his body, more then double the limit for UK drivers and almost 10 times the legal limit for commercial pilots, CNN reports.
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Jitsukawa admitted to drinking two bottles of wine and a jug of beer the night before he was due to fly from London to Japan.
The BBC reports that another pilot, Julian Monaghan, was jailed for eight months after he was caught with 86 mg of alcohol in his system earlier this year.
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