EasyJet suspends pilots who played Snapchat game at 30,000ft

Photographer Ian Georgeson, 07921 567360 Edinburgh Airport, New Flight Path, Easyjet

The budget airline carrier said the pair had been stopped from flying “pending a disciplinary investigation”.

In a video published by a national newspaper, the co-pilot can be seen completing paperwork with a virtual owl dancing on the screen beside him.

Later, he dances next to an animated character with the aircraft said to be at 30,000ft.

The videos, obtained by The Sun, were filmed during a flight from Paris to Madrid on Wednesday.

Neither of the pilots were looking at the controls or at the path of the plane as they fooled around on social media.

Captain Michel Castellucci was responsible for posting the video.

Mr Castellucci captioned the video, posted to his Instagram account ‘pilot_flyingnut’ : “Dancing first officer in cruise doing paperwork.”

The captain then posted a selfie on Instagram, asking his followers if they wanted “more”, describing himself and his colleague as “#TeamFlyingnut”.

The joke film was viewed more than 6,000 times before the social media account was deleted.

A worried viewer commented on the video: “The cockpit duo were not focused on the controls, just on having a good time. It only takes seconds for something catastrophic to go wrong, even in cruise control.

An easyJet spokesperson stressed the safety of the passengers “was at no point” compromised, but added the pilots would be spoken to as “this falls well short of the high standards easyJet expects of its pilots”.

“It is not acceptable and is not representative of the thousands of highly professional pilots who work for the airline,” they said.

“We take this issue seriously and as such the pilots have been suspended (in line with our procedures) pending a disciplinary investigation.”