Flying doctor comes down to Earth

Poor Brynne Gordon. She must have thought all her worst fears had come true yesterday when her flying doctor became the man who fell to Earth - albeit not for the first time.

Last month, on the eve of the wedding of the 26-year-old former fitness instructor to the 66-year-old deregistered medico and one-time jailbird Geoffrey Edelsten, Ms Gordon confessed that her soon-to-be-husband's latest adrenaline fix didn't lift her spirits.

''He loves it, but I do worry, especially since he's got his first solo lesson soon,'' the young American said of her husband's passion for flying. ''I don't want that.''

Well, here's hoping the good ex-doc starts tuning in to his wife's feminine intuition before it's too late. At about 10am yesterday, while making that first solo flight at Moorabbin Airport, the doctor came a cropper in his chopper. According to witnesses, he's lucky to be alive. According to the media, we're lucky to have him still. A world without Geoffrey Edelsten would be a browner shade of fake tan.

Aerial photos taken yesterday of the stricken craft surrounded by fire-dousing foam made it look like a chicken drumstick on a bed of creamy mashed potato, and Edelsten must briefly have imagined he'd eaten his last meal without knowing it. ''I looked up to see the broken windshield and glass and thought, 'This can't be Heaven, so I must still be alive','' he said shortly after being pulled from the wreckage.

The whole thing happened in the blink of an eye, he said. ''I'd hardly left the ground when the aircraft rolled and hit the ground. With helicopter accidents they can turn out to be quite nasty. I'm very grateful that I wasn't injured.''

Edelsten's love of flashy machinery is well established. His personal website features a gallery of super cars - including Ferraris, Porsches, Lamborghinis, Bentleys and Hummers - with an invitation to anyone keen ''to make an offer to rent or purchase'' to make contact.

It is part of AFL folklore that when he bought the Sydney Swans in August 1985, he announced his purchase by having the pink-and-white helicopter he allegedly had bought for then-wife Leanne fly above Princes Park, where the Swans were playing Carlton.

Years later, though, Edelsten denied ever owning the pink helicopter. ''I certainly had a helicopter to enable me to get to the hospital from home to deliver babies, but it was blue and white, not pink,'' he was quoted saying in the 2006 history of the Swans, Shake Down The Thunder. ''It's amazing how many people thought they actually saw the non-existent pink helicopter.'' (To see the chopper's very existent 1985 flight, see tinyurl.com/pinkchopper.)

Edelsten's wedding to Ms Gordon last month - a simple affair on a tight $2 million budget before 500 of their closest acquaintances, including Seinfeld's Jason Alexander and The Nanny's Fran Drescher - featured a light-and-sound show that simulated the landing of a helicopter. Once the lights were turned on, Edelsten's new bride was revealed to be standing next to a chopper.

After yesterday's crash, Edelsten was swiftly onto the phone to his wife. When he told her what had happened, her first response was disbelief. ''She thought I was joking,'' Edelsten said.

There was no word on what else Brynne had to say, but chances are high that it sounded a lot like: ''You're grounded.''