Flying High: Meet Mack Rutherford, the youngest pilot to fly solo around the world
Flying High: Meet Mack Rutherford, the youngest pilot to fly solo around the world
He came, he saw and he flew around the world on his own!
Mack Rutherford, a 17-year-old Belgian-British pilot has broken all records to become the youngest person to fly across the world solo in a small plane that took off in March this year.
Battling rough monsoons and sandstorms, Rutherford finally landed on an airstrip in Bulgaria’s capital Sofia.
For being the youngest person in the world to embark on this arduous trip around the world, Mack has earned a place in the Guinness World Record.
Let’s take a closer look at how Mack achieved this milestone.
From Alaska to Japan, what did his trip look like?
Rutherford’s journey began on 23 March this year from Bulgaria’s capital Sofia. From there, he travelled through 52 countries over five continents.
The flight, which was sponsored by a web hosting company called ICDSoft, took him through Africa and the Gulf region to all the way to India, China, South Korea and Japan.
Crossing the equator twice on his journey, Mack crossed the northern Pacific and landed on a volcanic island near the Bering Strait, after 10 uninterrupted hours of flying.
He then headed to Alaska and down the West Coast of United States to further south to Mexico. He travelled back to the north along the US East Coast to Canada.
Finally, he took the route across the Atlantic Ocean to reach his final destination in Europe.
The teenager flew a Shark, a high-performance ultralight aircraft that can hit a cruising speed of around 300 km per hour.
What challenges did he face during his trip?
The trip lasted longer than expected due to unprecedented obstacles like monsoon rain, sandstorms in Sudan, extreme heat in Dubai, airport closures in India and countless technical issues.
Mack is making a few adjustments before his flight this morning. #macksolo pic.twitter.com/aFF1skFZuw
— The Museum of Flight (@museumofflight) August 7, 2022
According to The Guardian, Rutherford said that the most “hairiest moment” for him was when he had to sleep in a shed at an empty Pacific Island.
He said, “It’s actually an uninhabited island, so if anything had gone wrong I would be on my own, on that island, so really important that nothing went wrong. I landed there and had to sleep in a small shed on the side of the runway because it was completely abandoned for over 10 years.”
Aviation runs through the family
Mack’s website suggests that his great-great-grandmother was among the first South African women to learn flying.
His father, Sam Rutherford is a professional ferry pilot and his mother Beatrice Rutherford is a private pilot.
Mack’s sister Zara is known to be the youngest woman to fly solo across the world.
Zara, who concluded her own journey in January this year, said that the family was in constant touch with Mack. According to a Daily Mail report, she said, “While he was flying, I constantly tried to keep in touch and help him. Our parents called him every day, and I joined in those conversations. I gave him advice on the route, on the flight, so that I could be useful to him.”
Mack qualified for his pilot’s licence in 2020 when he was only 15.
Who was the previous record-holder?
In 2021, Travis Ludlow from England took off from Netherlands to cover a distance of 40,072 km in 44 days.
His journey took him across Europe, Russian and America before he finally returned to Netherlands via Canada, Greenland and Iceland.
During his trip, Ludlow battled with extreme weather conditions, loneliness and fatigue, according to a BBC report.
Travis made halt in 12 countries- Poland, Russia, US, Canada, Greenland, Iceland, UK, Ireland, Spain, Morocco, France and Belgium.
With inputs from agencies
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