THE hero pilot who helped successfully crash-land a plane after its engines failed is back at his home in Worcester.

After a whirlwind few days, modest captain Peter Burkill has returned to the loving arms of his wife Maria and their three children Troy, aged two; Logan, 15 months, and 11-week-old Coby.

Speaking to your Worcester News yesterday at their home in King Stephen's Mount, off Henwick Road, Mrs Burkill, aged 33, said the events of the last few days have made the family re-evaluate life.

"We are really pleased with all the support that we have had from family and friends," she said. "We want to thank them all for everything they have been put through.

"We are back home now and we have got a very hard time ahead and we are going to have to start thinking about things.

"We are looking forward to meeting up with everybody again - something like this really makes you realise how fragile life is.

"You just don't expect that when your partner goes off to work they might not come back.

"I'm really proud of him and he's just been ever so modest about what has happened."

Capt Burkill was unable to talk to your Worcester News because of an ongoing investigation into how the Boeing 777 lost power as it came in to land at Heathrow Airport on Thursday.

During the rapid descent the 43-year-old kept his cool and helped to guide flight BA038 onto the runway After the miraculous landing, during which the plane was evacuated of its 136 passengers and 16 crew members, just 13 people were treated in hospital for minor injuries. Following the incident the Wheatsheaf Inn - the venue for Troy's first birthday party - paid homage to Capt Burkill's heroism and landlady of the Henwick Road pub Jane Shields called his efforts a "tremendous feat".

"All of the people in here know them and we felt slightly woozy after the event. We couldn't possibly imagine what Maria was feeling or how Troy was because what was going on must have been quite frightening for them," she said.

"Everybody has said that if you were going to crash they would have wanted that crew in charge. We are all quite impressed with what he did."

Mrs Shields said she would like to try and arrange a special party for the Burkill family.