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Thomas Salme

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Swedish aviator (born 1969)

Thomas Salme<br>Born (1969-02-18) February 18, 1969 (age 57)<br>Stockholm, Sweden

Thomas Harry Salme (born 18 February 1969, in Stockholm)[1] was convicted of flying passenger jets without a commercial pilot's license. After working as a First Officer and Captain from 1997 to 2010 for several international airline companies, Salme was arrested at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport in March 2010.

History<br>[edit]

In 1997, Salme, who worked as a maintenance engineer for SAS,[2] and had never flown a large aircraft, applied to the Italian airline company Air One to be a co-pilot, using false papers and a forged ID number, and was hired.[3] He had learned to fly passenger jets using a flight simulator at Stockholm Arlanda Airport a friend gave him off-hours access to.[4][2][5]

In 1999, he was promoted to captain and kept on working for Air One until 2006. He then moved to the Turkish-owned airline company Corendon Airlines, where he worked as a Captain for a year before being offered a contract at the British airline Jet2. After only ten months he decided to go back to work for Corendon, where he regularly flew passenger jets for another two years.[6] Salme accumulated 10,000 hours in the air while flying without a valid commercial pilot's license.[4][7]

Salme was arrested at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport in March 2010, while seated in the cockpit of a Corendon Boeing 737 carrying 101 passengers just a few minutes before take-off to Ankara, Turkey.[8] Officers, who were alerted by a tip from Swedish authorities, said the man had once had a private pilot license, but it had expired and it never qualified him for passenger flights. As a result, he was fined 2,000 Euros (£1,700 or $2,700) and was banned from flying for 12 months by a Dutch court, which rejected the prosecutor's request for a three-month suspended jail sentence.[4][9]

Speaking through his lawyer, Salme said he had no plans to fly again.[9] He wrote a book in Swedish about his experiences, En bluffpilots bekännelse ("Confessions of a Con Pilot"), published in 2012 by Norstedts förlag.[10][11][12]

In the analysis of The Times, Salme's employer "bore part of the blame" because of its "laissez-faire approach to background checks".[8] According to The Times and the South China Morning Post, this was one of a series of fake resume scandals as a result of which airlines and other employers tightened their vetting procedures concerning resume claims made by job applicants.[8][13] Corendon Airlines tightened its vetting procedures for hiring pilots in the wake of this scandal.[14]

References<br>[edit]

^ Francalacci, Nadia (2011). Paura di volare (in Italian). Chiarelettere. p. 19. ISBN 978-88-6190-198-8 – via Google Books. Thomas Harry Salme nasce a Stoccolma il 18 febbraio 1969 e ad ascoltarlo sembra un disco rotto.

^ a b Erskine, Carol (20 May 2010). "Fake pilot Thomas Salme says passengers were never at risk". News.com.au.

^ Pinnegar, Edward (2011). Airline Scams and Scandals. The History Press. ISBN 978-0-7524-7837-1. Retrieved 1 August 2019 – via Google Books.

^ a b c Staff (17 May 2010). "Fake pilot who flew for 13 years without licence fined £1,700". The Telegraph.

^ Mozelius, Peter (21 November 2018). "Game-construction students experiences of educational games - gaming outcomes and learning outcomes" (PDF). ICTE Journal. 7 (2): 5–16. doi:10.1515/ijicte-2018-0005. ISSN 1805-3726. Archived from the original (PDF) on 23 April 2025. Without any pilot licence, except for a home-made one, he worked as a pilot for several international airline companies during 13 years. How to fly passenger planes was something he learnt during night sessions with SAS-owned flight simulators at the Arlanda airport in Sweden.

^ Fox, Jennifer (2025-11-15). "The Estonian-rooted pilot who flew for 13 years without a licence". Estonian World. Retrieved 2026-02-05.

^ Nénin, François (20 May 2015). Oups ! On a oublié de sortir le train d'atterrissage: Histoires vraies et insolites de l'aérien (in French). Fayard. ISBN 978-2-213-68818-3. Retrieved 1 August 2019 – via Google Books.

^ a b c Monaghan, Gabrielle (20 May 2012). "No flights of fancy on CVs: Employers are wising up to the candidates who lie about their pasts". The Times.

^ a b "No Jail for Unlicensed Pilot who Flew Jetliners". CBS News. Associated Press. 13 April 2010.

^ Thunberg, Karin (8 June 2012). "En luftburen bedragare" (in Swedish). Svenska Dagbladet. Retrieved 1 August 2019.

^ Elmblad, Katarina Arnstadt (16 August 2012). "Du borde få lite mera xxx i dig" (in Swedish). Aftonbladet. Retrieved 1 August 2019.

^ Ivarsson, Av Måns (4 March 2009). "Efter 20 år som pilot avslöjades Williams hemlighet". Expressen (in Swedish). Retrieved 1 August 2019.

^ So,...