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The pilot of the plane that crashed while carrying footballer Emiliano Sala,David Ibbotson is claimed to probably be affected by carbon monoxide poisoning.

The 59-year-old pilot was flying Sala on a Piper Malibu aircraft from Nantes to Cardiff in January 2019, however, the aircraft suffered an in-flight break up while being flown too fast for its design limits, the final Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB) report has confirmed.

The investigation also claimed that the pilot flew too fast and lost control while attempting to avoid bad weather.

Investigators found that a contributory factor in the crash was Mr Ibbotson having no training in night flying and a lack of practice in relying only on cockpit instruments to control a plane.

The investigator in charge Geraint Herbert, summarising the findings, said:

“Control of the aircraft was lost during a manually flown turn and the aircraft descended rapidly accelerating.

“The aircraft rolled to the left and there was an abrupt nose-up control input, at a speed well above the maximum permitted for such an input.”

“It was likely that the pilot’s ability to control the flight was impaired to some extent by carbon monoxide poisoning,” he added.

Sala’s body was recovered from the wreckage of the plane, but Mr Ibbotson was never found.

Source- Daily Star