Woman planning global flight keeping eye on India

Orlando: Whenever Carol- Ann Garratt shows off the single-engine airplane she plans to pilot around the globe in world-record time, the invariable reaction is:
“But it’s so tiny!”
But Garratt, a 53-year-old Central Florida pilot, isn’t worried about her plane, whose two rear seats have been removed to make room for extra fuel tanks. It has been around the world before, although at a more leisurely pace, on her 2003 solo trip to raise awareness of Lou Gehrig’s disease, the inevitably fatal illness that claimed Garratt’s mother in 2002.
Garratt isn’t worried about her co-pilot, either. In 2006, Carol Foy of Spicewood, Texas, won an all-female air race across the United States. Foy has a cousin who is battling the Lou Gehrig’s disease, also known as ALS.
No, what keeps Garratt awake at night is India.
Though she is not planning a stop in the country, she does need to fly over it on her record-setting, fundraising flight for ALS. And that means she needs a permit from the Indian government. But in recent days, terrorist violence has erupted in the capital, where suspected Muslim militants killed scores of people and took hostages, burning buildings and shooting randomly.
“If it looks like the permit is going to come through during the trip, we’ll leave as scheduled,” Garratt said Friday as she made final preparations. “If not, we’ll wait another week or two. But we’re going. I’ve put too much into this.”
Takeoff is scheduled for Tuesday at 9 p.m. from Orlando International Airport. If all goes as planned, they’ll land again seven days, 12 hours and 43 minutes later.
30/11/08 Kate Santich/The Orlando Sentinel/Bradenton Herald, United States

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Categories: Foreign Dec 2008