The 5 Most Irresponsible Pilot Actions Ever That Put Passengers' Lives at Risk

Of all the potential problems that can arise while traveling, the last place travelers expect to encounter a problem is in the airplane cockpit. The pilot is the steadfast figure trusted to guide a complicated piece of machinery safely to its destination, sometimes flying in the face of nature. But occasionally, a pilot will spectacularly fall down on the job, coming close to causing disaster themselves. These are 5 of the most irresponsible pilot actions that put passengers' lives at risk.

On Monday, the New York Post reported that an experienced Delta pilot allegedly showed up drunk for a flight from Scotland to New York City and was arrested after passengers had already boarded. The 61-year-old pilot was arrested last Friday morning at Edinburgh Airport for having a blood-alcohol level above 20 milligrams of alcohol in 100 milliliters of blood.

As shocking as that story might seem, it's not the only one recently. On March 3, a JetBlue pilot was removed from the cockpit of a plane about to leave Buffalo Niagara International Airport on Wednesday after officials determined he had a blood alcohol content four times above the legal limit, authorities said.

He was "removed from his duties," the airline said in a statement. The pilot was passing through security when TSA agents observed that he might have been impaired, The Buffalo News reported.

On an Ethiopian Airlines flight last Aug. 15, pilots of a Boeing 737 didn't begin their scheduled landing in Addis Ababa on time, ultimately flying over the airport at 37,000 feet. Air traffic controllers tried to contact the pilots several times, to no avail.

Then the autopilot disconnected, and an alarm sounded, waking the pair, who had fallen asleep in the cockpit. The pilots then turned the plane around and landed 25 minutes late.

In Colorado on Jan. 7, an AirLife medical helicopter pilot was arrested in Elizabeth, Colorado, on his way to work on suspicion of drunk driving. CBS Colorado reported that breath tests showed his blood alcohol level was .126 at the time.

The former army aviator was ultimately charged with driving under the influence and resigned from his position.

In July 2017, two Air Canada pilots narrowly avoided a collision while landing at San Francisco International Airport late at night. The crew was seconds from landing their Airbus A320 jet on a taxiway where other planes loaded with passengers were waiting to take off.

The National Transportation Safety Board found that the pilots were apparently confused because one of two parallel runways was closed and dark, and the flight's captain had been awake for more than 19 hours while the first officer on the flight from Toronto had been awake 12 hours.