VERDICTS of accidental death have been recorded on a family of four who died when their light aircraft crashed in poor weather when it tried to land at Dunkeswell Airfield.

Tech company chief executive Philip Garvey, 56, his wife Ann, 55, daughter Emily, 23, and son Daniel, 20, died when their six-seat Piper Malibu Mirage came down in November 2015.

Somerset Coroner’s Court was told that the Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB) carried out a thorough inquiry into the fatal accident and produced a detailed report.

It concluded the accident may have been caused by Mr Garvey, who was flying the plane, trying to manually start a landing descent while the autopilot was still on.

Somerset Coroner Tony Williams read extracts from the report during the inquest in Taunton.

He said: “The evidence from the autopilot examination system suggested that, as the pilot turned onto the final approach and started to descend, the autopilot may not have been disengaged due to a mental lapse, incorrect button selection or a technical fault.

“The investigation was unable to determine with certainty the reason for the initial rapid climb. However, it was considered possible that the pilot had initiated the preceding descent by overriding the autopilot.

“This would have caused the autopilot to trim nose-up, increasing the force against the pilot’s manual input. Such an out-of-trim condition, combined with entry into cloud, could have contributed to an unintentional and disorientating pitch-up manoeuvre.” Mr Williams said the report explained that if Mr Garvey tried to descend with the autopilot on, it would fight him as it attempted to maintain its set height, causing it to go nose-up. While the aircraft would still have been controllable, the report said, recovery ‘may have been beyond his capabilities’.

The court heard that Mr Garvey had been a pilot since 2012 and had bought the aircraft – his second – in the summer of 2013.

He had flown to Dunkeswell 25 times since September, 2013, including 14 times from Fairoaks.

While instructors found him good at ‘doing things by numbers’ they said he was ‘less able than average pilots at multi-tasking and poor at prioritising, especially when under pressure’.

The court heard that pathologist Dr Russell Delaney had found that Mr Garvey was suffering from severe coronary artery disease and had reported a recent bout of dizziness.

Recording separate conclusions of accidental death, Mr Williams said: “I think I should record that despite the extensive and detailed investigation by the AAIB, they were unable to determine with certainty the cause of the accident.”