On Wednesday 31 July 2019, two Daher TBM aircraft stopped at St Helena Airport on an epic pole to pole journey.

N771AM (a Daher TBM 850) arrived at St Helena Airport with a total of three occupants – a grandfather, father and grandson.  All three family members hold active pilots’ licences, a feat made all-the-more remarkable by the 56 years difference between the youngest who is 23 years of age and the eldest who is 89 years of age.

N444CD (a Daher TBM 930) arrived with two occupants – a father and son.  19-year-old Alex is the only one of the five visitors not to have a pilots’ licences although he is thinking about learning to fly. In the meantime, Alex is the navigator for N444CD.

After a well-deserved rest and recuperation overnight, the visitors then took to the St Helenian waters to try their hand at fishing; fish were caught and the anglers partook of their spoils before heading onward to Angola at 14:40 on Thursday 1 August.  This presented onlookers at the airport with the unique opportunity of watching two aircraft taxi down St Helena Airport’s runway at the same time.

Photos of the aircraft can be found in our Media Centre galleries, and the intrepid aviators’ progress on their journey can be followed on-line at  https://share.garmin.com/N444CD and https://www.instagram.com/dierk.reuter/

1 August 2019