A few weeks, FITA founder Gautam Lewis, was invited to take part in a podcast by the wonderful team at Private Fly. PrivateFly is a global booking service for private jet charter and private aircraft hire.

Launched in 2007, http://www.PrivateFly.com/ is the fastest growing private aviation company in Europe, combining award-winning booking technology with a dedicated 24/7 team of private aviation experts.

Here is the podcast: http://blog.privatefly.com/interviewing-high-flyers-gautam-lewis

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Ade Adepitan MBE is a British television presenter and wheelchair basketball player. He uses a wheelchair as a result of contracting polio as a child which led to the loss of use of his left leg. Freedom in the Air (FITA) founder and co-chairman who also battled polio first met Ade during a wheelchair basketball training session with the Raiders team in West London. Both men have a deep understanding of how important voluntary organisations are in the world today.

FITA had the pleasure of giving Ade his first flying lesson just before the London 2012 Paralympic games started. 2012 sees Ade spearheading all things Olympic / Paralympic. Ade is Read more →

Lars Anderson is already a glider pilot from Denmark. He could not find any flying school with hand controls near his home or indeed anywhere in Denmark. He scoured the internet to find the union control for C172 at Freedom in the Air. He come for 1 week during June 2011, got his medical flight test out the way, flew 7 hrs including navigation around Luton Class D controlled airspace, which is remarkable for someone who has never flown in an aeroplane with an engine. Here is his story. He will return in the spring of 2012 to complete his PPL.

Paolo Pocobelli started to fall in love with aviation in his early childhood. During the years at high school he gained his first wings, becoming a private pilot in 1991. That was also the time when his passion for aerobatic flight and the airshows business became stronger and stronger. In 1993 he started to jump as a skydiver and a skydiving videographer at the weekends. It was during a sunny June Sunday in 1994 that he had a skydiving accident.

He calls it “a bad day in the office”. Definitely was a bad day, since he broke two vertebrae and a femur. The femur’s fracture was annoying, but the vertebrae definitely changed his mood. At least for a while. Paolo suffered a spinal cord injury that made him paraplegic. He came to Cranfield recently to fly with FITA and renew his JAR PPL FCL. Just before he drove back to Italy we had a quick chat to him about disabled aviation focusing on the issue of hand controls.

He is setting up Ali Pertutti (Wings for all) in Italy so hopfully many Italians with disabilities can follow and emulate what Paolo has achieved. We are very proud to know Paolo and look forward to crossing the airways with him.

Aaron Morgan was recently interviewed by Freedom in the Air, a not-for-profit community interest organisation specialising in providing flights and training for those with disabilities looking to learn how to pilot an aircraft.

Aaron competed in motocross for nine years until he had an accident in 2006 which left him paralysed. But this didn’t dampen his enthusiasm for sport and, in particular, motorsport. Initially following the accident Aaron took up wheelchair tennis, but his heart was still set on continuing in motorsport and after finding out that he could learn to drive a year earlier than able-bodied people, he started taking lessons.

He passed his driving test first time in May 2007 and two years later he became the youngest ever disabled person to be awarded an MSA National B race license.  FITA met up with Aaron again to see how he gets on with flying aeroplanes.

Aaron Morgan from the UK is a racing car driver with disabilities. He drives in the BMW production series championships. His car is fitted with hand controls. Freedom in the Air met up with Aaron to find out how his life changed when he became disabled after a bike crash when he was only 15 years old.

Freedom in the Air interviews people who we admire and respect to answer some questions. Not all our heroes are pilots by the way. We speak to those whose attitude’s towards aviation and disability is inspiring and motivating. We speak to people who can educate us audience, surprise us and are supportive of people with disability in aviation and the wider world.

Click here to watch and read other interviews..