A HISTORY teacher at Bishops’ Blue Coat High School in Chester has friends in high places.

Terri Hull was taking a party of GCSE students to Berlin during half term when the pilot introduced himself to passengers and she realised he was a former pupil of hers at the Great Boughton school.

She said: “The announcement came over the tannoy saying: ‘I’m Chris Boothman and I’m going to be flying you to Berlin this morning’.

“I realised who he was immediately as I had been involved in writing Chris’s reference for easyJet as he was a member of one of my tutor groups.

“I sent a message to the flight deck and it was confirmed.”

When Chris, from Runcorn, safely landed the plane in Germany he invited his former teacher and the pupils to visit him on the flight deck.

Mrs Hull added: “Chris had always wanted to be a commercial airline pilot and he has fulfilled his dream, aged just 25.

“The cabin staff were highly amused by events, my current students were spellbound and I was glowing with pride at my quite immaculately turned-out role model!”

Chris left Bishops’ Blue Coat in 2005 with A-levels in maths, physics and leisure and recreation.

Initially he embarked on an RAF engineering degree but moved into the commercial pilot field. He now works for easyJet, operating out of Manchester.

The five-day history study trip to Berlin included visits to 30 different historical venues.

Mrs Hull said: “A visit to the German capital in ‘Theme Year 2013’ was particularly significant because Berlin has chosen to mark the 80th anniversary of Hitler’s chancellorship with a number of ‘Pillar Exhibitions’, located at historically important sites throughout the city.

“This urban exhibition illustrates how the social and cultural diversity of the city was erased by the National Socialists after 1933.

“Prominent personalities who were supposedly removed from the collective memory included Albert Einstein and Bertolt Brecht, together with less well known writers, artists, poets, photographers, scientists, sporting individuals, musicians and architects.”

Staff at Bishops’ Blue Coat are planning a history trip to Russia later this year.