[Born To Fly 01] • Born To Fly

**“I will never forget my first flight, the feeling of being pushed back in the seat, the rumbling that suddenly turned into silence. It fascinated me then, it does now.”**

When Ryan Campbell was six, he fell in love with aeroplanes. Inspired by his first flight, and his uncle and grandfather who were both aviators, flying was a passion that dominated his childhood. It was no surprise to his family and friends when at 15 Ryan became the youngest pilot in Australia. Then he found a challenge that spoke to him more than the rest…

In **Born to Fly**, Ryan recounts his remarkable journey from a boy  with a dream to becoming, at age 19, the youngest person ever to circumnavigate the globe solo in a single-engine aircraft.

Drawing on the advice of renowned aviators such as Dick Smith, Jim Hazelton (‘a man who has more hours adjusting his seat in a plane than I do total flying time’) and mentor Ken Evers, Ryan fundraised and planned with great determination, before finally setting out on his thrilling 70-day odyssey, landing 34 times in 15 countries and covering more than 24,000 nautical miles.

From his wings icing up over Greenland’s glaciers to a heart-stopping moment in the midst of Indonesian airspace; abuse from an airport official in Greece, to awe at the sight of molten lava entering the Pacific, this real-life adventure story shares with us the dry-mouthed terror and heady exhilaration of flying alone with only one engine.

**Born to Fly** is a fascinating view of the world from above from an inspiring young Australian.

**'The most extraordinary aviation adventure of the decade. A great story in the spirit of Charles Kingsford-Smith and Bert Hinkler.’ - Dick Smith**