Now this is a VFR cross country

That microlight story is incredible. Slightly mad to do it but incredible. Having done it in a Mirage, the thought of doing it in a microlight like that is beyond me.

Those are astonishing trips – crappy Daily Trash reporting notwithstanding (“aircraft not designed to fly over water”).

He could have taken something much healthier than 200 mars bars

I can hardly think of anything worse to eat on a long trip.

But, seriously, what is the risk on trips like these, with today’s navigation tools? It is basically an engine failure. With his 1000nm range (to zero fuel, presumably) one can fly to most places, and if he can burn car petrol than he can (with possibly considerable hassle – he needs more than a jerrycan or two) fly anywhere in the world.

In the old days, pre-GPS, you could conceivably have got lost in some place where you would have died and nobody would find your remains for another 50 years. I am sure there are many such wrecks still undiscovered.

Very brave!

A guy I know once flew a Piper Super Cruiser (a Cub variant) eastward around the world, starting in the US and making it the whole way… Until he ran out of fuel over water before reaching Alaska. This was a long time ago, before any modern navigation or communication, I’d guess 50 years ago, and I suppose it was a miracle he successfully ditched and was rescued. It’s not something I’d want to do, but on the other hand it’s set him up with stories for a life time!

About the same time period a guy flew a Luscome from the US to Germany, with double the normal fuel capacity in the wings. The same guy later disappeared over the Pacific someplace in a Bonanza.

More recently I seem to remember a young French couple who flew to the Oshkosh Fly-In in a microlight.

Well, he has flown a CT with a quite proven Rotax engine, so I think the chances of an engine power loss is less than in a ferry flight with a mid- to high time Conti or Lyco with unknown maintenance or operation background.

This guy was at Knockbain farm strip, Dingwall, last summer in his Skyranger after crossing via Baffin Island, Greenland, Iceland, and Shetland.

“The first part was a lengthy tour of the continent during which he had a structural failure over Botswana causing him to deploy the ballistic recovery system which landed him un-injured in a very remote location. Having activated his distress beacon he was eventually rescued by the Botswana Airforce. The aircraft was repaired and the journey continued all be it with another accident due to engine failure on take-off from Windhoek.
Other journeys were made through Europe and South America where he fitted floats and took in the length of the Amazon before heading for the Caribbean and the USA, ".

For those who are interested, it’s worth to occasionally have a look at earthrounders.com, where most ATW blogs are listed.

For those who don’t know, in last autumn, a group of (I believe) 8 aircraft flew together around the world, guided by the german magazine “Pilot & Flugzeug”. I believe it was the first time ever for such group of GA aircraft to do it together. What was also special about this was that they flew westwards (against the wind, mostly) and that they chose a very challenging routing via the North Pacific and Northern Russia (which made it a huge challenge for the only participating Avgas aircraft, a Mooney M20K).

Link

The blog of one of those airplanes, the afore mentioned Avgas plane. Very impressive account indeed.

Pilot und Flugzeug will publish a DVD with an account of that trip somewhen this spring. My order stands, these DVD’s are very interesting to watch.