The Planned Four-Month Trip Around The World In A Gyrocopter Has Finally Been Completed…Five Years Later

EAA has recently reported on the gyrocopter trip around the world by Norman Surplus. Here’s the report by EAA that shows what can be accomplished when a passion for recreational flying and the personal desire to raise awareness for a charity is taken to the limit.

EAA said that about two months ago, they were happy to welcome Northern Irish pilot Norman Surplus and his MT-03 autogyro G-YROX, aka Roxy, to Oshkosh as he worked his way across the United States.

Surplus set out more than five years ago in March 2010 from his home in Larne, Northern Ireland, in an attempt to be the first person to fly an autogyro around the world. His inspiration for the flight came from his desire to raise awareness for his designated charity, Bowel Cancer UK, after he was diagnosed with the illness himself before learning to fly.

While his original plans called for the 27,000-mile flight to be completed in approximately four months, as circumstances—and the immovable Russian bureaucracy—would have it, it would be almost five and a half years before he finally landed back on the auld sod.

Surplus completed his epic adventure last Tuesday when he flew from Oban, Scotland, across the Irish Sea, touching down at the Sandy Bay Playing Fields in his hometown of Larne. He was escorted for much of this last leg by a number of other gyros in a loose yet triumphant formation.

Because he was forced to ship Roxy across the Pacific, the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale (FAI) won’t credit him with the full circumnavigation record. However, he’s already set multiple other records, including becoming the first person in the 92-year history of autogyro flight to successfully fly one across the Atlantic.

(Photo by Brady Lane furnished by EAA)

FMI: www.eaa.org