Link to report on today's court appearance: Emiliano Sala: Pair admit accessing post-mortem CCTV

Those persons are the first to appear in court.
There seems to be a loud silence concerning the rest of the people involved directly or not in the footballer's death.
Those who commissioned the flight, the aircraft broker who even lent his credit card to the pilot.
Hard to believe how a parachute dropping pilot, only involved in a few illegal air-taxi operations, could be considered even remotely qualified for air charter transport of a VIP.
Obviously the aircraft broker contacted the pilot, and knew everything about his qualifications and recency on the aircraft...

AAIB second special report published
https://www.gov.uk/aaib-reports/aaib...-malibu-n264db
Sala's blood contained Carbon Monoxide at over 50%, which is considered a potentially fatal dose.

Well this puts a new perspective on things...
Possibly fatal levels of Carbon Monoxide...
AAIB

That changes things somewhat - 50% is well over the fatal concentration. Carbon monoxide is a byproduct of incomplete combustion, so that is most likely to be either exhaust leakage into the cabin or a fire. This might throw a new light on the strange behaviour of the plane in the last few minutes of flight if the pilot was also being overcome by fumes.

Sala 'exposed to carbon monoxide in plane crash'
 

Footballer Emiliano Sala, who died in a plane crash over the English Channel, had been exposed to high levels of carbon monoxide, a report has revealed.

Sala and pilot David Ibbotson, crashed on 21 January when travelling to Cardiff from the French city of Nantes.

The Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB) said in a report that toxicology tests found a high saturation level of carbon monoxide in Sala's blood.

Mr Ibbotson, from Crowle, Lincolnshire, has still not been found.

But it is likely he would also have been exposed to carbon monoxide, the report added.


[https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-49345186

Emiliano Sala exposed to harmful levels of carbon monoxide on board aircraft
 

Brings a whole different slant to the investigation!

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknew...cid=spartanntp

If I remember right, there is some questions about the pilots competency / legality of caring fare paying passenger. But does this finding mean that aircraft was at fault rather than the pilot ? I presume small or any aircraft don't have carbon monoxide alarms ?

Higher than the level generally considered to be potentially fatal, in fact.

Given the layout of the Malibu, it's likely that the pilot was similarly affected to at least some extent.

CO exposure could certainly affect pilot performance and judgement. A long time ago I was the passenger in a C150 which was later found to have a faulty muffler. I have no recollection of the pilot landing the plane, I recall riding in the right seat, and then waking up lying in the grass under the wing after we landed. The pilot said I had turned very red, and began to loose consciousness, so he landed back. Darned luck thing he did, as he was being affected too, just not as fast as I was. The certification requirement for the Piper Malibu would require that the CO concentration in the cabin air not exceed 50 PPM in flight.

Alarms are not expensive at all, they should be required equipment. In my state (Washington) all bedrooms are required to have both smoke and CO alarms and many companies make combination alarms. They are available in AC, DC, or battery powered, some with 20 year batteries. Unfortunately I have not found any DC alarms that would announce "Carbon Monoxide alert" in English, yet another high pitched beep that you have to figure out is not as useful as I would like, but better than nothing.

a spot on a card. in the dark? that will work well! so whilst the findings dont exonerate the legality of the flight, loss of capacity does go some WAY explain the crash

In the UK, it's easy to buy a domestic battery-powered CO detector. I'm guessing those would work just fine in a cockpit.

Recently on Discovery? Here in UK
 

Please do not believe this, as it is NOT true. All internal combustion engines produce carbon monoxide. Indeed, all naked flames wil produce small amounts - it's an inescapable fact of combustion. The problem with carbon monoxide is that when breathed in it avidly attaches to haemoglobin as it appears just like oxygen to the haem moeity. Unfortunately, unlike oxygen which floats off readily, once attached the carbon monoxide is very difficult to remove, typically taking 4 hours in air to dissociate. Thus small concentrations in air gradually accumulate to much higher concentrations in the bloodstream. Once the carbon monoxide is there it prevents oxygen now being transported round the body and this will lead to headaches, nausea, vomiting, fitting and death.

I repeat. All internal combustion produces carbon monoxide which is lethal. Please do not suggest anything different.