Flying Partner Of Crash Pilot: 'There Are Risks'

The flying partner of the Shoreham jet crash pilot has told Sky News the disaster made him question whether he should continue flying.

But Chris Heames, one of Britain's most experienced fast jet pilots with 6,000 flying hours, says performing aerobatics in vintage planes over land is safe and he will carry on flying within the rules.

"Aerobatic displays in themselves are not inherently dangerous because what you do is fly them to a very structured programme," he said.

"In that way it can be kept safe, I've been flying public displays for 25 years and I can safely say I've never really frightened myself too much doing it."

Mr Heames shared the flying rota of the Hawker Hunter jet with pilot Andy Hill who was at the controls when it crashed at the Shoreham airshow on Saturday killing at least 11 people.

Despite new restrictions on aerobatic displays brought in after the disaster, Mr Heames say he believes aerobatics over land should continue.

"We all know that there are risks involved, there are risks involved in walking across the road."

"But you look both ways and do your risk assessment and decide whether you walk across the road, the same applies with an aeroplane of that nature," Mr Heames said.

Mr Heames said the plane would usually be flown in the middle of its capabilities during a display and was a joy to fly.

"It's very light and precise on its controls, it's travelling at up to 450mph in a display so you need to be thinking a long way ahead of the aeroplane to plan what you're doing, but the aeroplane itself is an utter delight," he said.

"We don't fly it to the extremes that the military would ... we very rarely pull more than 4G [although] the aeroplane is capable of 7G," he explained.

"We operate the aeroplane in a sympathetic way because people don't want to see you do very aggressive aerobatics they want to see a smooth flowing display that shows off a beautiful aeroplane in its proper environment"

Mr Heames said he and Andy Hill each perform at around 40 airshows every year and that the disaster has affected every one of the dozen or so civilian fast jet pilots they work with.

"Andy's a good friend, so [we are] devastated with what's happened with the injuries to him, but the collateral damage is horrendous and it's had a huge impact on everybody, we're all stunned that something so terrible could happen," he said.

"Why it happened I don't know and we will have to wait till the Air Accident Investigation Branch have dissected all the accident in huge detail to find out exactly what went wrong."

"Everybody is pulling together and hoping that Andy recovers," he said. "It's a hard time we're doing our best to support each other and get through it."