Plane-spotters return home from Indian nightmare

Two Bristol plane-spotters have returned home from India after being fined for intercepting communications between pilots and authorities at Delhi airport.
Stephen Hampton, 46, and Steven Ayres, 56, were arrested last month after checking in to a hotel near Indira Gandhi International Airport.
Mr Hampton, from Keynsham, and Mr Ayres, from St George, were fined 25,000 rupees each – about £365 – but escaped a 10-year jail term when they avoided possible spying charges.
They aroused suspicion after they had asked for a room overlooking the runway, and were found with cameras, binoculars, a laptop and radio scanner.
Prosecutors had urged the judge to hand down the maximum penalty of a three-year sentence in the country’s notoriously overcrowded Tihar prison.
But the court in Delhi showed mercy after hearing the pair were nothing more than ‘plane-obsessed’ Englishmen who had made an innocent mistake.
There were tears as the pair arrived in Keynsham today to meet the press at the British Legion Club. During interviews, Mr Ayres said “the experience doesn’t mean I’ll give up my hobby”.
10/03/10 Bristol 24-7, UK

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Categories: Airports Mar 2010, Foreign Mar 2010