This dramatic incident involved Sir Elton John’s pilot executing an emergency maneuver to dodge a bird of prey that swooped toward their plane during takeoff.
The 78-year-old music icon was aboard a Boeing 737 with his family when a “huge hawk” suddenly dove at the aircraft while it was speeding down the runway at Farnborough Airport in Hampshire.
Video footage from the cockpit reveals pilot Duncan Gillespie taking decisive action just as the plane was preparing to lift off.
In the recording, Gillespie can be heard saying, “delay… bird… oh s**t,” as he swiftly responds to the unexpected threat.
His quick reaction helped avert a potential disaster by delaying the takeoff.
As the plane finally ascends, Gillespie comments, “we’d have whacked,” to which his co-pilot replies, “F***ing falcon, that was a big a** bird!”
Mr Gillespie later said he had ‘dodged a bullet’ for the first time in his career, after narrowly avoiding the bird just before the plane took off for Paris on Friday, January 23.
Alongside the footage on his Facebook page, Mr Gillespie wrote: ‘I had to make a judgment call yesterday, getting airborne out of Farnborough airport and I’m not shy to share it with you.
Sir Elton John’s private jet had a terrifying close call this week when the Rocket Man’s pilot had to make an ‘unorthodox’ manoeuvre
Sir Elton’s pilot Duncan Gillespie was forced to react quickly when he spotted a ‘huge hawk’ as he prepared to take off
‘Taking off with a 25 knot crosswind, we were just passing our V1 decision speed, after which I’m obliged to take off, when I saw a huge hawk diving at us – there were two of them, I think he was protecting his mate.
‘For the first time in my flying career I made the decision to delay getting airborne to pass under the bird. My colleague and I were both of the clear opinion that if we’d have rotated when we should have we’d have taken the hawk through the left-hand engine.
‘Now this is the kind of decision only a human could make; there’s no way a machine could ever make such a decision.’
He added: ‘We dodged a bullet yesterday, with the original Rocket Man and his family on board and I’m proud of the very unorthodox procedure which we used to avoid a major incident, saving millions of dollars in damages.’
Sir Elton was in 2022 caught in a terrifying mid-air drama as his private jet suffered hydraulic failure en route to New York, then twice failed to make an emergency landing due to high winds.
The singer was travelling from Farnborough Airport for a gig in New York and was at 10,000ft over Ireland when pilots decided they had to return due to a problem with the plane’s hydraulic systems.
The pilot radioed ahead and requested an emergency landing with fire crews racing to the runway to be on hand.
The pop legend, 78, was on board the Boeing 737 with his family when a ‘huge hawk’ dived at the aircraft as it hurtled down the runway at Farnborough Airport, in Hampshire (pictured)
But as Storm Franklin’s 80mph winds buffeted the airfield the plane was twice forced to abort its emergency landing and go around again, only successfully touching down at the third attempt.
Emergency services surrounded the £66million Bombardier Global Express jet as it came to a halt, with sources telling The Sun Sir Elton was ‘shaken’ by the incident.
One source said: ‘The jet was being buffeted and couldn’t land. It was horrible to see.’
Just two years ago, the deadliest bird strike in history took place when a jet in South Korea flew through a flock of Baikal teal migratory ducks during its landing approach.
The Jeju Air flight 2216 from Bangkok, Thailand, crash-landed on its belly at Muan International Airport before skidding off the runway and blowing up, killing all but two of the 181 people on board, minutes after a reported bird strike.
Fatal disasters due to bird strikes are rare – but not unheard of.
In October 1960, a flock of starlings caused a deadly plane crash in Boston Harbour after smashing into Eastern Airlines Flight 375 shortly after it took off from Logan International Airport.
The strike wreaked havoc on the plane, destroying one propeller engine and causing two others to momentarily lose thrust.
In just 20 seconds, the flight lost control and plunged into the water, killing 62 of the 72 people on board – in what was dubbed America’s worst bird strike disaster.
