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Captain Ian Shoobridge

Captain Ian Shoobridge, who was killed in an air accident on December 2 aged 51, was one of the most gifted helicopter pilots of his generation.

In November 1981 Shoobridge was serving with the Army Air Corps in Northern Ireland when he was involved in an emergency evacuation of casualties. He was then a sergeant, and was coming to the end of a five-month tour with 654 Composite Squadron Army Air Corps in the province.

At 10pm on November 26, he was the captain of a Lynx helicopter on 24-hour duty at St Angelo, Enniskillen, when a report of a large explosion came in to the Operations Room.

A bomb had been detonated at the vehicle checkpoint at Mullinbridge in Fermanagh County, close to the border with the Irish Republic, injuring four soldiers and four civilians. The blast also destroyed telephone wires and radio masts, and no communication with the site of the incident was possible.

It was a dark night, with rain and snow showers, but Shoobridge decided to fly a six-man Airborne Reaction Force, together with a doctor and assistant, to the site of the explosion. As they approached the checkpoint, the weather deteriorated; and the situation was made more hazardous by high ground to the east and west and on the border to the south.

But Shoobridge, who had already completed five hours' flying duty that afternoon, continued the sortie, and managed to drop his passengers at the site.

Throughout this period it was impossible to make contact with the troops because of the damage to their radios and their state of shock. As the Reaction Force searched for casualties, the last of whom was found in a pigsty into which he had been thrown by the blast, Shoobridge continued to provide "nightsun" overhead with the powerful searchlight on his helicopter.

He picked up the casualties, and returned to St Angelo to refuel before flying on to Belfast. With the cloud base lowering, he had to climb into it, and he received radar, ground-controlled navigation to RAF Aldergrove.

There he broke cloud at 500ft, and followed the road at low level to deliver the most seriously injured man to Musgrave Park Hospital, where he had to undergo immediate surgery.

Shoobridge was awarded the Air Force Medal for his actions, the citation stating that he had proved himself an outstanding aviator whose calm and cool handling of the situation had made possible a very difficult casualty evacuation in deteriorating weather conditions.

Ian Shoobridge was born on August 21 1952 at Ashford, Kent, and educated at Tollington School, Muswell Hill, north London. In 1968 he enlisted in the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers at Arborfield, Berkshire, and the following year was posted to BAOR at Verden.

In 1972 he moved to the AAC Centre at Middle Wallop, Hampshire, and served as an aircraft technician with the Blue Eagles' Display Team. He attended a pilots' course in 1976 and, having got his wings the following year, he was attached to 658 Squadron AAC, part of 4 Regiment, at Minden, Germany. This posting included short tours in Northern Ireland and with the United Nations' forces in Cyprus.

Shoobridge's transfer to the Army Air Corps in 1980 was followed by postings to 654 Squadron AAC at Detmold, Germany, with intermittent tours to Northern Ireland. After a posting to 656 Squadron AAC at Netheravon, he attended the Central Flying School at Shawbury, near Telford, Shropshire, and in 1986 qualified as a helicopter instructor.

Returning to Middle Wallop, Shoobridge served as a QHI with Lynx Flight of 671 Operational Training Squadron. After the Blue Eagles were re-formed he served as a pilot with their display team.

In 1988 he was posted to 653 Squadron, part of 3 Regiment AAC, at Soest, Germany, and was commissioned the following year. While he was there, he went to 654 Squadron, part of 4 Regiment, in the Gulf, in the lead-up to the war, to train and qualify crews in the techniques of desert flying.

In 1991 Shoobridge joined the Aviation Standards Branch at AAC Centre, Middle Wallop, and retired from the Army in 1995. He then joined the South Western Electricity Board before moving to Quantel, part of the Carlton Television Group, as a corporate pilot.

Shoobridge joined Fast Helicopters, based at Thruxton Airfield, Hampshire, early in 2000 as a commercial pilot. On December 2 2003 he was piloting two engineers in a Twin Squirrel helicopter when it crashed into woodland north of Andover. There were no survivors. He had logged more than 9,000 flying hours in a career spanning 25 years and had an unblemished record.

A popular figure in the Wiltshire village where he lived, Shoobridge was an excellent cook and was highly proficient at DIY. He had a love-hate relationship with golf, at which his ambition was never quite realised in his performance. He did The Daily Telegraph crossword daily; wherever he was in the world, the newspaper was sent to him.

Ian Shoobridge married, in 1980, Susan Gospage, who survives him with their daughter.

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