Millions Against Malaria update

Victorian pilots Ken Evers and Tim Pryse have reached the halfway point of their charity round the world flight in a GA8 Airvan.

As part of the Evers-initiated Millions Against Malaria project, the pair are flying around the world to raise money for Malaria awareness, while also commemorating the Centenary of Australian Aviation. Using the Gippsland Aeronautics GA8 Airvan, the pair are setting a world first by circumnavigating the globe in an Australian commercially manufactured single engine aircraft.  

Evers, Pryse and their trusty Airvan reached the halfway point of their mammoth adventure when they landed in Accra, Ghana earlier this week.

The journey started with a May 8 departure from Bendigo, with the pair crossing the Pacific Ocean to Mojave, California on the US mainland with refuelling stops at Norfolk Island, American Samoa, Christmas Island in Kiribati and Hilo, Hawaii. At Mojave the Airvan received scheduled servicing.

From Mojave the crew flew across the southern states of the US to New Orleans with a stop at Phoenix, Arizona. Their landing at Phoenix coincided with the opening of a new office for Mahindra Engineering Services, a sponsor of the flight.

The next stop after New Orleans was Kingston, Jamaica, where the crew found that they had flown into a full scale state of emergency that had erupted since their departure from the US 12 hours earlier. The crew said they could here gunfire and explosions near the airport. From Jamaica the route then took them to Barbados in the Caribbean and then via various landing places to Natal, Brazil.

From Brazil the crew had originally planned to cross the Atlantic Ocean to Ghana, however, as severe weather in Africa looked like delaying the flight, the pilots opted to enter Africa via Namibia with a refuelling stop at the tiny Ascension Island in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Ascension Island, which played a crucial role in the Falklands war, is under British possession but the island’s Wideawake airbase is jointly run by the RAF and the USAF. For this reason obtaining permission to land there normally takes three weeks, however, due to the nature of the flight permission was quickly granted.

The crew then attempted to make the crossing to Namibia but were thwarted by strong headwinds and were forced to return to Ascension. The following day a break in the weather in Ghana enabled them to complete the Atlantic crossing to Accra.

The crew are currently crossing Equatorial Africa to Entebbe, Uganda. Their final stop in Africa will be Dar As Salaam, Tanzania, where the Airvan will be serviced before the flight across the Indian Ocean to Bangalore, India via a refuelling stop in the Seychelles. From India the route takes them across the Bay of Bengal and southeast Asia to Zamboanga in the Philippines. From there they will fly to various locations in Papua New Guinea before returning to Bendigo via Cairns.

When Evers and Pryse arrive back at Bendigo – around July 10 – they will have flown through 16 countries, clocked up 27,167 nautical miles and between them logged 233.7 flight hours. Their incredible efforts warrant admiration in spades, not to mention a donation to their worthy cause. For more info on the Millions Against Malaria flight and to donate click here.