Fly for MS: A Record-Breaking Awareness Flight
Two local pilots, Keith Siilats and Andrei Florolu, departed yesterday from FRG for a two-month long, 29,000 mile journey to Europe to raise awareness for multiple sclerosis. And oh yeah...they're traveling in a Cessna 340 with stops in over 30 countries.
The trans-Atlantic crossing alone will take about four days with landings in Canada, Greenland, Iceland, and Norway. See the map below for the full route and click on it for a link to the website:
http://flyforms.org/images/route%20z...%20shadow3.png
Keith, who has been an acquaintance of mine for a few months, left last night with Andrei and Florian Trojer, who many of you may know from his photography in Austria, and one other passenger. Flo was able to fly over to the states specifically for the trans-Atlantic portion of the trip and I was lucky enough to host him for the day that he was in NYC.
Before they left 'for good', I tagged along for a 20 minute joyride around Long Island with a local man who has multiple sclerosis, Tom Clyne. Turned out that Tom used to work in communications for the Air Force and had some crazy flying stories to share, but this ride - which included some zero-G stuff just for the hell of it - was something else. Maria Pulice was also there to document the short flight and has a nice writeup with pictures here. (My pictures are on Flo's 40D, so stay tuned).
The flight ultimately departed at 6:00pm for St. Georges and Quebec City, Canada. As I type this the airplane is in Kuujjuaq (way North) with the next stop being one island over: Greenland. Track their flight in N7841Q here, though remember that the information may not be reliable, or there at all, as they get further away.
We had also made arrangements for a little formation flying so we could get air-to-air photos of 41Q before they turned on course. I rode along with the owner of a local flight school in a Piper Warrior (N80FG) to capture the moment:
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http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4100/...e984c02b_z.jpg
Take the time to check out their website for the trip at www.FlyForMS.org and please consider supporting them in even the smallest of ways.
Brian
