<div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>The spotlight has been shone on a helicopter operator's drug testing regime after a pilot killed in a horror mid-air crash tested positive to cocaine.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>Sea World Helicopters pilot Ashley Jenkinson, 40, was among four people killed when two joy flights collided outside a Gold Coast theme park on January 2, 2023.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>Jenkinson tested positive for cocaine metabolites at his autopsy following what is considered one of Australia's worst air disasters.</span></div></div><div><div id="adspot-mobile-medium"></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><strong><span>READ MORE:</span></strong><span> </span><a href="https://www.9news.com.au/world/why-did-she-take-innocent-children-hakyung-lee-sentenced-to-life-imprisonment-for-double-murders/de19fd0f-3465-4fc3-a32b-648778389d45" rel="" target="_blank" title=""><strong><span>NZ mum handed life in prison for murdering her children</span></strong></a></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>Almost three years after the Sea World tragedy, an inquest into the crash was told daily drug tests were not carried out on the helicopter operator's pilots.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>Sea World Helicopters had a 10-year agreement to run joy flights after taking over from Village Roadshow Theme Parks on the Gold Coast in 2019.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>The helicopter company had continued a policy of having pilots breath tested for alcohol by Sea World staff before every shift, Village head of operations Llewella McNabb told the inquest in Brisbane.</span></div></div><div><div class="OUTBRAIN" data-reactroot="" data-src="//www.9news.com.au/national/sea-world-helicopter-crash-inquest-no-daily-drug-tests-for-pilots-before-sea-world-crash/c527e20b-d437-41d9-a35f-2f48f20d8f3d" data-widget-id="AR_5"></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>However they were not drug tested before every shift, coroner Carol Lee was told.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>"Sea World helicopter pilots can be drug tested on suspicion but even though pilots are engaging in activities considered high risk they are not tested on that basis?" counsel assisting Ian Harvey said.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>Pilots were drug tested by Village nurses at random and before their first day of employment, McNabb said.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>"It does take time. Drug testing takes longer," she said.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>"Drug testing can take up to 20 minutes. With saliva swab tests you do have to wait sufficient time. It depends on the individual."</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><strong><span>READ MORE:</span></strong><span> </span><a href="https://www.9news.com.au/national/melbourne-airport-two-women-charged-after-33-million-illegal-find-in-their-suitcases/a18a655f-f1e9-4d7c-b106-bbd42089043b" rel="" target="_blank" title=""><strong><span>Two young women facing life in prison over $33 million find in their suitcases</span></strong></a></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>McNabb said she did not write the policy and did not know if the test time duration was the reason for not performing daily drug screening.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>Experts are due to testify next week as to whether Jenkinson could have been medically, cognitively or psychologically impaired to some degree by the effects of cocaine usage.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>The inquest will over the next two weeks look at 11 critical issues surrounding the crash that also killed British newlyweds Ronald and Diane Hughes - aged 65 and 67 - and Sydney mother Vanessa Tadros, 36.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>Jenkinson was "unlikely to have been directly affected by the drug at the time of the accident," a previous Australian Transport Safety Bureau investigation found.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>Village subjected Jenkinson to a random drug test in August 2022, Lee heard.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>Jackson Simm, a former pilot at Sea World Helicopters, testified he had not known of any drug problems among pilots at the theme park's helipad.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>"Did you socialise at all with Ashley Jenkinson?" Harvey said.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>"No," Simm said.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>The Gold Coast broadwater around Sea World was an "extremely busy air space" that included people on parachutes being towed behind power boats, Simm testified.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>"I've got experience with half a dozen operators around the country and I found the Sea World induction process was extensive and thorough," he said.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>Jenkinson's aircraft fell about 40 metres before crashing on a sandbar after the mid-air collision.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>The pilot of the second helicopter, Michael James, managed an emergency landing on the same sandbar.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>James died in 2024 of a medical condition unrelated to the crash.</span></div></div>