Bernie Ecclestone Detained in Portugal Over Shotgun Incident

Bernie Ecclestone’s latest brush with the law did not come at a racetrack or in a courtroom, but on the tarmac of a small Portuguese airfield.

The 95-year-old former Formula 1 supremo was stopped and briefly detained on Monday after landing on his private jet at Tires airfield, near the coastal resort of Cascais outside Lisbon, when police discovered he had brought a shotgun into the country without the required documentation.

Ecclestone told Reuters by phone from Portugal that the weapon had travelled with him from Switzerland, where he uses it for clay pigeon shooting. He said he intended to take part in a clay shooting event in Portugal linked to an exhibition over the weekend, but did not have the necessary “blue book” authorising the import of the gun.

He arrived with his wife Fabiana, a Brazilian who serves as vice-president for sport at Formula 1’s governing body, and passed through customs without incident. The issue surfaced only when police questioned him about the firearm and asked to see the paperwork.

What followed, in Ecclestone’s words, was “unnecessary aggravation”.

Unable to speak Portuguese, the former F1 boss found himself held up while officers and customs officials dealt with the situation. His wife then travelled to Lisbon, accompanied by a customs official, to hand the shotgun over to the authorities.

“So now we’ve gone through all this and the people in Lisbon have got the gun,” Ecclestone said. “I’ve signed some documents as they wanted.”

Portuguese newspapers first revealed the incident, citing police sources who said the shotgun was discovered during a routine check.

Ecclestone, a former racer who went on to control the commercial side of Formula 1 for around four decades before being removed from his role in 2017, owns a home in the nearby resort area. The setting was familiar. The scenario was not.

The episode inevitably recalls his earlier run-in with authorities in Brazil in 2022, when he was briefly detained for carrying an unregistered small handgun while boarding a private plane to Switzerland. On that occasion he acknowledged owning the weapon but said he did not know it was in his luggage, dismissing the affair as “silly” and “tiny”.

Different country, different weapon, same storyline: a man who once ruled the paddock now finding that the rules away from the circuit can be just as unforgiving.