Letter: Qualified to be a hero

Sir: I am entirely in agreement with Captain Jones, the pilot of the aircraft which force landed at Manchester Airport ("Hero pilot fights shy of praise", 7 August).

If he is a hero, as the media and others maintain, it does not say very much for the training and proficiency of British Airways pilots. They rightly describe the incident as routine emergency drill. The one wheel landing was within the competence of any qualified airline or air force pilot and to suggest otherwise must wrongly damage people's confidence in British Airways.

Canon PAUL GODDARD

(Ex RAF pilot)

Polruan-by-Fowey, Cornwall