Sala “deeply unconscious” before plane plunged into the sea

Wednesday 23 February 2022

Footballer Emiliano Sala would have been unconscious when his plane crashed in January 2019, according to the pathologist who spoke at his inquest this week.

The inquest into Mr Sala’s death began last week and is expected to run until 17 March.

It will determine the events which led to Mr Sala's death, who was involved and in what way and how Mr Sala’s body was recovered.

He was travelling from Nantes to Cardiff in a single engine Piper Malibu aircraft when it hit bad weather and crashed in the waters between Guernsey and Alderney. Both Mr Sala and the pilot, David Ibbotson, were killed. 

The organiser of the flight, David Henderson, was found guilty last year of recklessly endangering the safety of an aircraft and sentenced to 18 months in prison.

Pictured: Mr Sala's inquest was told that the footballer had a carbon monoxide blood saturation level of 58%.

At the inquest in Bournemouth, pathologist Dr Basil Purdue said that tests of Mr Sala’s blood showed carbon monoxide poisoning and would have made him “deeply unconscious” when the plane hit the sea.

It was suggested that this level of poisoning could have come from the plane’s exhaust system and could have affected Mr Ibbotson as well. However, this cannot be determined conclusively because Mr Ibbotson's body was not found.

The inquest also heard that Mr Sala was a smoker, something unknown to his family and not raised on a medical questionnaire he had filled in as part of his £15million transfer to Cardiff City, which he was flying to the UK to complete when his plane came down. 

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