Hundreds of Virgin Atlantic passengers landed in Britain on Sunday, 24 hours late after their pilot was charged with being drunk.

Captain Richard Harwell, 55, was arrested on Friday just before he was due to fly a Boeing 747-400 from Washington DC's Dulles Airport to London Heathrow, the airline said.

Flight VS 022 was canceled and nearly 400 passengers were put up in hotels overnight before a replacement crew was brought in to take them to London.

"I was very shocked," said passenger Francesca Sait, 18, from Essex, east of London, after arriving at Heathrow. "I didn't want to think about what could have happened."

Barbara Davidson, from London, traveling with her 12-week-old son, Peter, praised security staff in Washington.

"I just thought thank heavens he didn't fly us across the Atlantic," she said. "I was very grateful that the security people who stopped him did their jobs." A Virgin Atlantic Spokesman said the pilot was due to be arraigned at a court in the Washington DC area on Monday.

"He has been charged with attempting to operate an aircraft under the influence of alcohol and will face a judge tomorrow," the spokesman said.

Virgin Atlantic said it has a strict no-alcohol policy and that it had launched an internal inquiry.

"Everyone at Virgin Atlantic is shocked and surprised," the company said in a statement. "This is unprecedented."

(Reuters)