Divorce would likely cost McCartney a large amount

When he's 64, Paul McCartney may well be on a long and winding road — through the courts — in one of Britain's most expensive divorce cases.

With Wednesday's announcement that the former Beatle and his second wife, Heather Mills McCartney, have separated, speculation immediately turned to the financial settlements surrounding the end of their four-year marriage.

"She could get a huge chunk of his wealth," said Patricia Hollings, a divorce specialist with the London legal firm Finers Stephens Innocent. Hollings said that Mills McCartney's relatively young age — she is 38 — and the fact that they have a child, combined with McCartney's "staggering" wealth and celebrity status, have the potential to push the settlement into the stratosphere.