An American Eagle captain preparing his jet for takeoff Friday morning from the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport was removed from the aircraft and arrested on suspicion of being under the influence of alcohol, an airport spokesman said.

Airport police boarded the Bombardier CRJ-700 aircraft at about 5:57 a.m. as the 48-year-old pilot from Raleigh, N.C., was seated in the cockpit and making his pre-flight checks for the 6:10 a.m. flight to New York's LaGuardia Airport, said Twin Cities airport spokesman Patrick Hogan.

The pilot of the 65-seat airliner came under suspicion when officers and a TSA agent at a checkpoint "detected the odor of a consumed alcohol beverage as they passed by [the pilot] waiting to enter the elevator," police said in a release of public arrest data.

The pilot for the regional airline, which is owned by American Airlines, was given and failed a preliminary alcohol breath test, and he was taken into custody and brought to Fairview Southdale Hospital for a blood-alcohol test, Hogan added. Passengers had yet to board, he added.

Hogan said he has yet to receive any specific measurement for the pilot's blood alcohol level. The legal limit for flying in Minnesota is 0.04 percent, which is also what federal regulations require. That is half the legal limit in Minnesota for driving a motor vehicle.

The pilot, who has yet to be charged, was booked and then released on his own recognizance at about 10:30 a.m. to airline personnel.

"Blood alcohol test results likely won't be available for a few weeks, and the case remains an active investigation," Hogan said.

There were 53 passengers booked for the flight, said airlines spokesman Matt Miller. Flight 4590 left at 8:50 a.m. once a replacement for the captain was arranged, Miller added.

Miller said in a statement that "American Eagle has a well-established substance abuse policy that is designed to put the safety of our customers and employees first. We are cooperating with authorities and conducting a full internal investigation. The pilot will be withheld from service pending the outcome of the investigation."

Along with the 0.04 percent limit, Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) regulations also prohibit any pilot from flying within eight hours of drinking alcohol, what the agency calls "bottle to throttle."

In an FAA brochure aimed at pilots titled "Alcohol and Flying: A Deadly Combination," the agency touches several times on the perils of drinking the previous day or evening and then waking up and climbing in the cockpit, even if it has been more than eight hours have passed since that last drink.

"A hangover effect ... may be just as dangerous as the intoxication itself," the document reads. "Consider the effects of a hangover. Eight hours from 'bottle to throttle' does not mean you are in the best physical condition to fly or that your blood-alcohol concentration is below the legal limits."

Incidents of commercial pilots being found with a "confirmed breath alcohol concentration" of 0.04 percent or higher have held steady in recent years, according to FAA figures, ranging from 10 to 13 since 2008. Since 1995, the highest figure was 22 in 2002.

One of the most notorious cases of a pilot drinking and flying occurred in 1990, when the captain, flight engineer and first officer were arrested when their flight from Fargo landed at the Twin Cities airport. A patron of a Fargo-area bar had tipped off authorities that the crew had been drinking heavily there the night before.

Paul Walsh • 612-673-4482