A vintage fighter jet crashed killing 11 men when it hit a road and burst into a fireball during a failed airshow stunt "purely" because of "pilot error", a court heard.

Andrew Hill was flying the Hawker Hunter too low when he lost control over the A27 during the Shoreham Airshow in 2015, jurors were told on Tuesday.

The 1950s fighter jet plummeted onto the West Sussex dual carriageway while it was performing a loop stunt at 1.22pm on August 22.

The trained Royal Air Force instructor, who was a British Airways captain at the time, was thrown clear of the aircraft but taken to hospital with serious injuries and placed into an induced coma before being discharged.

Although an experienced pilot, he had been known to take "risks" and one of his airshow displays the year before was brought to a halt because of his "dangerous" flying, the court heard.