Freedom Wings at Cranfield Airport, EGTC
On TUESDAY 24th August 2010, Freedom in the Air (FITA) will be hosting a ‘Introduction to Aviation’ day beginning at 09:30 from Cranfield Airport in Bedfordshire. The day is named, for obvious reasons, Freedom Wings and, with the support of Cranfield Airport, will be Freedom in the Air’s fourth at the Airport for the 2010 summer flying season. A movie from the our first flying day with Variety Club can be seen here –
A group of young people with disabilities will find the sky is the limit this week when they have a free flying lesson at a Bedfordshire airfield.
Disabled flying school Freedom in the Air is holding a Freedom Wings taster day at Cranfield Airport on Tuesday, and has invited 23 people aged between nine and 19 to learn how to pilot a plane.
The young people all have some form of disability and attend the Young Inclusive People (YIP) club at the Pemberton Centre in Rushden.
Freedom in the Air founder Gautam Lewis, who uses crutches after contracting polio as a child in India, organised the Freedom Wing day to show people disability is not a barrier to achievement.
He said: “I thought maybe I should do something positive about supporting disabled people, help them learn new skills and push them to a new level of confidence so that they can have opportunities.
“It’s trying to show what we can do regardless of disability.”
The young people will look around a light aircraft and airport hangars, learn how aeroplanes work and then take to the skies for 30 minutes with an instructor, who will let them take control if they feel confident enough.
Three previous Freedom Wings days at the airport were very successful, and Gautam plans to hold two more in September.
Wheelchair user Janette Marsland, who attended the last Freedom Wings day in July with the activity club PHAB, said: “You leave the wheelchair on the ground, no restrictions and you carry on – it’s confidence, it’s freedom, it’s fantastic. I did not want to land the plane and just fly off into the sunset.”
The YIP club is funded by Northamptonshire County Council and managed by Cultural Community Partnerships (CCP), a sports, leisure and cultural trust.
Mike Willoughby, chief flying instructor at FITA, said: “Both myself and our organisation are keen to support the promotion of aviation to disabled people.
“We are happy to do as much as we can to help disabled people become pilots. As an instructor, I am naturally keen to encourage anyone to learn to fly.”
Together we intend to show that anyone with a disability can reach for the skies, and achieve virtually anything, sometimes with only the very smallest amount of support. The pilots ‘one off’ flight could be as life changing for them as someone who flies every week and ends up with their Private Pilots Licence. To have piloted an aircraft even once is clearly a massive experience for a person with a disability and a huge achievement.
FITA is a not-for-profit organisation based in London, which is committed to opening horizons for people with disabilities so that they can fly higher socially, physically and professionally. For more information about go to www.freedomintheair.org.
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