Captain X
(observations of the problems affecting my son)

Behaviour changes ....

"Over the last three years, I have been concerned as I became more and more aware of changes in my son's well-being and behavior. Increasingly, the well adjusted, cheerful, responsible and kindly man was becoming short tempered and impossible to reason with. Now it is clear that was poisoning by toxic air.

The BAe146 aircraft, which he has flown for over ten years, has impaired his health and has contributed to these changes.

The symptoms

As we live in different parts of England, I see him infrequently, but staying with his family over the years, I have felt a growing dismay when I saw how exhausted he often appeared to be and how easily he fell asleep during the day - unusual for a man in his prime.

There were times when his cognitive powers seemed poor (once he told me that, after long hours in the cockpit, if someone asked him to tell them what 2 plus 2 made, he couldn't tell them), also his memory was uncertain and, on occasions, I was concerned at the very unusual, frenzied way in which he was talking. This was before the revelations about organo-phosphate poisoning.

Working conditions

On my visits I heard accounts of how my son's employers were increasingly showing scant consideration for their pilots, in the way the rostering schedules were arranged.

Crews were missing out on rest periods, poor feeding arrangements were experienced and there was constant encroachment on any private life - family events were spoiled - and my son's frustration was rising as these conditions deteriorated.

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