US PILOT SUSPENDED FOR ANTI-GAY RANT

A US pilot has been suspended after his cockpit rant about gay flight attendants was accidently broadcast across the airwaves.

During the March 25 flight, the Southwest Airlines pilot complained about his dating woes because, he said, the majority of flight attendants he flew with at one point were either gay or “grannies”.

The comments were overheard by Houston air traffic controllers and other nearby aircraft and recorded.

“It was a continuous stream of gays and grannies,” the man said about his co-workers in the almost three-minute long conversation with his co-pilot.

“Six months, I went to the bar three times – three times! Once with the granny and the fag, and I wish I hadn’t gone. At the very end, with two girls, one of them that was probably do-able.”

He later said: “Now I’m back in Houston, which is easily one of the ugliest bases. I mean it’s all these fucking old dudes and grannies and there’s like maybe a handful of cute chicks,” he said.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said that while the pilot’s conversation was intended to be a private one it “included offensive language and disparaging characterisations of certain groups and individuals.”

The airline has not identified the pilot. He was temporarily suspended without pay and made to attend “sensitivity training” before returning to work.