the times | Friday March 18 2022 23
News
Dead pilot injured
in previous jet crash
ing a “terrifying huge roar” as it came
down. Leonardo said the flight plan
included tests on the jet’s capabilities
but “at 11.35am any contact with the air-
craft was lost”.
In July 2019 Ashley was badly injured
when he ejected after a mid-air colli-
sion during combat manoeuvres while
training in Qatar. He sustained a bro-
ken back and fractured eye socket and
his mask and visor were torn off as he
left the cockpit, later describing “a par-
ticularly savage parachute landing”.
In an interview about the incident, he
said: “As I pulled the handle for the
ejector there was no delay at all and
wa-bang! I felt my back break on the
way out and then, as I hit the airflow, my
mask and visor came off. It felt like
someone had hit me in the face with a
bat.
“I thought I’d lost my right eye. It
quickly went from normality to broken
back, blood everywhere, can’t see out of
my eye, in a parachute, going ‘I’m not
quite sure what happened there’ .”
Ashley obtained a flying scholarship
with the RAF aged 17 and took part in
numerous combat operations. He spent
18 years in the military, including six at
RAF Cottesmore where he flew Harri-
ers and was a weapons instructor.
He was then a flight commander in
charge of F-18s for the Canadian armed
forces for three years before joining
BAE Systems as a fighter pilot instruct-
or. He later went freelance and started
a property firm with his wife, Heather.Tom Kington Rome
Neil Johnston
MAX WILLCOCK/BNPSJudge held
court hearing
while driving
Jonathan Ames Legal EditorA judge has been disciplined for mis-
conduct after he oversaw a court hear-
ing on a hands-free mobile phone while
driving.
The lord chief justice, Lord Burnett of
Maldon, the most senior judicial figure
in England and Wales, issued Christo-
pher McMurtie with a formal warning
for having “failed to meet the expecta-
tion to avoid conduct which might
reduce respect for judicial office”.
A report by the judicial conduct
investigations office said that McMur-
tie, who was appointed as a deputy dis-
trict judge three years ago, conducted a
hearing in his car “partly while driving
and using his phone in hands-free
mode”.
The office said it “took into consider-
ation that Judge McMurtrie accepted
that his decision to proceed with the
hearing, after he had to travel un-
expectedly for personal reasons, was
misguided, and he gave assurances as to
his future conduct”.
The disciplinary process for judges
has been criticised as lacking in trans-
parency. In McMurtie’s case, the office
provided no detail of when the incident
happened or where the judge was
driving.
During the lockdowns, Robert Buck-
land QC, the lord chief justice and
Raab’s predecessor as lord chancellor,
ordered that many civil law hearings
should be conducted remotely.Catty paddle A hydrotherapist helps two-year-old Rocky exercise his legs as he
recovers from a nerve condition. A life vest keeps the cat afloat in the 20ft poolA British pilot who died on a training
flight in northern Italy had survived a
previous accident that broke his back.
Dave Ashley, 49, a father of two from
Poole, Dorset, was killed on Wednes-
day when an M-346 jet trainer crashed
near Lake Como 35 minutes into a test
flight. Both pilots ejected and Ashley’s
body was found later.
The aircraft crashed into Monte
Legnone, near Colico, Lombardy, after
leaving an airfield at Venegono Superi-
ore. Rescue services searched for the
crew on the slopes and Ashley’s co-
pilot, Giampaolo Goattin, a employee
of the Italian defence company
Leonardo, was found with light injuries.
Video taken by a climber near the
crash showed two parachutes descend-
ing, one on to high rocks and another
falling to lower slopes. Later video
showed smoke billowing from wreck-
age in a snow-covered ravine.
The pilots were cruising at 8,200 feet
when the jet caught fire and witnesses
described seeing a “fireball” and hear-
Dave Ashley, from
Poole, had spent
his life piloting jets