A trainee pilot died after she was bitten by a mosquito while in Belgium for her instrument ratings.

Twenty-one-year-old Oriana Pepper from Bury St Edmunds in Suffolk had passed her theory exams on the easyJet programme in Oxford and had travelled to Antwerp for the next part of her course.

While in the Belgium city in July 2021 she was bitten by a mosquito on her forehead, which became swollen and infected. She was given antibiotics in A&E but two days later her boyfriend took her back to hospital after she collapsed. She died three days later.

At her inquest, the coroner said she died ‘as a result of a serious infection caused by an insect bite to the forehead’.

Her medical cause of death was recorded as septic emboli in the brain, which are obstructions of blood vessels, with an infection by staphylococcus aureus bacteria

After the inquest, Miss Pepper’s mother said the family had set up in her memory a ‘small scholarship’ to encourage other women pilots, working with the British Women Pilots’ Association.