An airline pilot who admitted preparing to fly a passenger jet while at more than twice the legal alcohol limit has been jailed for 10 months.
Paul Grebenc, 35, was due to fly as first officer on a United Airlines flight from Glasgow airport to Newark, New Jersey, on 27 August last year when concerns were raised about his fitness to fly.
A blood test carried out later that day found he had 42mg of alcohol in 100ml of blood, more than twice the legal limit of 20mg.
Sheriff David Pender sentenced the former US air force pilot after Grebenc pleaded guilty to the offence at Paisley sheriff court on Thursday.
The court heard that on the morning of 27 August, Grebenc and United Airlines colleagues were brought to Glasgow airport from the Hilton hotel in the city, where they had spent the night, having flown from the US to Scotland the previous day.
They were due to fly a Boeing 757 to Newark with takeoff scheduled for 9am. As they passed through the search area, security staff smelled alcohol on the breath of the other first officer, Carlos Licona, and raised the alarm. Police were contacted and went to the departure gate, where Licona and Grebenc were removed from the flight.
The fiscal depute, Scot Dignan, said: “Police did not go on board the aircraft as they wanted to be discreet and not alarm passengers. Grebenc was asked to disembark with Licona as police also had suspicions regarding him.
“He was taken to a quieter spot. At about 9.30am he was asked to provide a specimen of breath for analysis which proved positive and he was taken in a marked police vehicle to Govan police station.”
The blood test later showed he was at more than twice the legal limit.
The plane took off later that day with a new crew and 141 passengers.
David McKie, defending Grebenc, said his client was extremely remorseful. He said: “He has asked me to express his remorse and apologises to the court and passengers for his irresponsibility and what was a significant misjudgment on his part. He takes full responsibility for his actions.”
As a US air force pilot Grebenc flew in war zones such as Iraq and Afghanistan, where his role was to carry out mid-air fuel transfers, and he had been involved in training young pilots, the court heard.
His wife is a pilot with the US air force and they live on an airbase in Mississippi. McKie told the court his client was under pressure at the time of the incident as there had been a recent family argument, while two weeks previously doctors had found a shadow on his son’s lung they feared might be cancerous, and the family had to wait until September to find out the prognosis. However, he said Grebenc recognised the seriousness of his actions.
He said: “He recognises that he ought to have stopped drinking at an earlier point that evening and his failure to do so will have catastrophic consequences for him, his career and for his family.”
McKie said his client had been placed on a rehabilitation programme by his employers in conjunction with the US Federal Aviation Administration.
Licona was sentenced to 10 months in prison earlier this month after he admitted boarding a flight while under the influence of alcohol.
- This article was amended on 23 March 2017. An earlier version wrongly said the blood test found Grebenc had 42 micrograms of alcohol in 100ml of blood and that the limit was 20 micrograms. In both cases it should have said milligrams instead of micrograms. This has been corrected.