Sir Alan plays down air crash drama

7:38pm Sunday 6th July 2008

Multi-millionaire Sir Alan Sugar has light-heartedly played down reports he "cheated death" when his light aircraft crashed at an airfield.

The star of the BBC's The Apprentice TV series joked he had more chance of dying from food poisoning by a sandwich given to him after the incident at Barton Aerodrome near Manchester.

He walked away unharmed after his four-seater plane landed in a thunderstorm and went through the runway and hit a rut in the ground on Saturday.

Sir Alan, 61, stepped out of the cockpit with a male travelling companion and the plane was towed away by tractor to a hangar.

The aircraft came to a halt short of the perimeter fence at the Eccles airfield, renamed City Airport Manchester last year, but was unable to fly again because the propeller was damaged.

Sir Alan said: "On Saturday during heavy rain and a thunderstorm we landed at Barton, a friendly and club-like airfield now named City Airport Manchester - a far grander name that it suggests with a grass runway about the same length as a football pitch.

"We landed and ran over the end of the slippery runway by about 15 feet into some taller grass.

"In doing so the propeller of the plane picked up some minor damage and according to the rules this means the plane can't fly unless checked out by a qualified engineer, of which there were none available.

"As far as "life-threatening" is concerned, to put things in perspective my friend and I had as much chance of dying from the incident as we did in dying from food poisoning from the tuna sandwich that a very nice lady made us in the clubhouse whilst we waited for a mate to pick us up and take us home."

Editor's choice