Pilots cleared of drinking allegation
N.Y.-Chicago flight was delayed nearly 4 hours
By Shia Kapos
Tribune staff reporter
Published September 6, 2002, 12:24 PM CDT
An airline flight out of New York City was nearly four hours late arriving in Chicago after a federal security screener Thursday night suspected its two pilots of having alcohol on their breath.
Both pilots were cleared and were returned to their plane after they took and passed Breathalyzer tests, officials said.
The incident began when the pilots for American Trans Air Flight 205 were going through the passenger screening area at La Guardia Airport in New York, officials said. The flight, with 152 passengers, was scheduled to depart at 6:40 p.m. for San Francisco with a stopover at Midway Airport.
"At one checkpoint, a screener thought he smelled alcohol," said Lisa Jacobson Brown, a spokeswoman for the Indianapolis-based airline. "But no one else did."
The screener's supervisor was called and also did not smell alcohol, Brown said. But at that point, the pilots requested Breathalyzer tests to prove they had not been drinking. Federal aviation regulations prohibit pilots from consuming alcohol just before a flight.
The two were transported to Kennedy International Airport because there was no Breathalyzer equipment at La Guardia, Brown said. She added, "They both took the tests, and they both came out 0.00."
"We are frustrated because it made our flight almost four hours late," Brown said. "It's upsetting that one person can falsely accuse the pilots of smelling like they had been drinking."
Thursday's incident was not the first time pilots have been accused of drinking before flying.
Last month, a Mesa Airlines pilot was fired after he tested positive for alcohol before a scheduled flight out of Little Rock, Ark. In July, a pilot on an ASA flight to Atlanta was grounded and later resigned after a security screener smelled alcohol on his breath.
Earlier that month, two America West pilots were removed from their plane after security crews suspected they had been drinking before a flight from Miami to Phoenix. Both were fired.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/n...i%2Dnews%2Dhed
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2 Pilots at La Guardia Removed From Plane for Alcohol Testing
By TINA KELLEY
A pilot and co-pilot were ordered off their plane at La Guardia Airport last night after alcohol was smelled on their breath, a Port Authority of New York and New Jersey police spokesman said last night. The pilot and co-pilot took Breathalyzer tests at a hospital, and no police action was taken against them, said the spokesman, Sgt. Eugene Leary.
"They supposedly went to the hospital voluntarily," he said.
Their plane, American Trans Air Flight 205 to Chicago, was scheduled to leave at 6:40 p.m. but was delayed by four hours, according to the airline's Web site.
The pilot and co-pilot were not visibly drunk when an ATA supervisor ordered them off the plane, Sergeant Leary said. The results of their Breathalyzer tests were not available last night, and an airline spokeswoman could not be reached late last night.
Throughout the summer, pilots have been disciplined for drinking before flying.
In July, two America West pilots taxiing for takeoff from Miami International Airport were ordered to return the plane to the terminal and were arrested on charges of operating a plane while drunk. Later that month, a co-pilot with ASA, a Delta Air Lines carrier that operates eight flights daily between Atlanta and Wilmington, N.C., was grounded after a security screener smelled alcohol on his breath and stopped him from boarding an Atlanta-bound flight. And in August, a Mesa Airlines pilot who tested positive for alcohol before a scheduled flight was fired.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/09/06/nyregion/06PILO.html