A Place In The Sun star Scarlette Douglas reveals she was meant to be on fatal plane crash that killed 228 people including her close friend

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By RICHARD EDEN FOR THE DAILY MAIL

Published: 10:06 BST, 20 June 2025 | Updated: 10:10 BST, 20 June 2025

As a presenter of TV show A Place in The Sun for seven years, air travel was part of the job for Scarlette Douglas.

But the star, 38, told the Daily Mail’s Richard Eden that she ‘hates flying’ for a heartbreaking reason.

Scarlette revealed she was meant to be on a doomed Air France flight which tragically crashed and killed more than 200 people – including her close friend.

‘I lost a really good friend of mine in the Air France crash from Brazil to France,’ she said at the Taste of London Food Festival opening party in Regent’s Park. 

‘The scary thing was I was supposed to be on that flight. She had booked it.’

Flight 447 from Rio de Janeiro to Paris crashed into the Atlantic on June 1, 2009, killing 228 people. 

Scarlette Douglas (pictured in June 2024) revealed she was meant to be on a doomed Air France flight which tragically crashed and killed more than 200 people – including her friend

Flight 447 from Rio de Janeiro to Paris crashed into the Atlantic on June 1, 2009, killing 228 people

Scarlette couldn’t take the flight because of a job she had in Hollywood.

The fatal crash occurred when three pilots panicked and failed to deal with faulty equipment during a storm. 

A 2023 ruling acquitted Air France and Airbus of ‘involuntary manslaughter’ following the crash.

During the investigation, it emerged that two of the pilots fell asleep, one after the other, when they were supposed to be in charge of the plane.

Flight recordings from the cockpit of the flight revealed the pilots’ last conversation before the aeroplane crashed.

One pilot said: ‘We’ve lost our speeds. I don’t know what’s happening.’

The automatic pilot disconnected, leaving the three pilots on board in charge.

Among the victims were Graham Gardner, a 52-year-old oil worker from Gourock, Renfrewshire, and Arthur Coakley, 61, an engineer from Whitby in North Yorkshire.

Scarlette (pictured earlier this month) couldn’t take the flight because of a job she had in Hollywood, but now ‘hates flying’ due to the tragedy  

Eleven-year-old Alexander Bjoroy, a boarder at Clifton College in Bristol, also died in the crash, along with PR executive Neil Warrior, who was 48.

Eithne Walls, 29, had been working at the Eye and Ear Hospital in Dublin and was on a trip to Brazil with friends.

One couple on the flight, a young doctor and lawyer, had married only the day before. After a wedding reception in a Rio nightclub, they had boarded the plane to begin their honeymoon. 

In 2010, a BBC2 documentary, Lost: The Mystery Of Flight 447, brought together leading aviation experts to conduct a forensic investigation into the crash. 

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A Place In The Sun star Scarlette Douglas reveals she was meant to be on fatal plane crash that killed 228 people including her close friend

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