Zero 3 Bravo: Solo Across America in a Small Plane - Softcover

Gosnell, Mariana

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0671892088 ISBN 13: 9780671892081

Publisher: Touchstone, 1994

Synopsis

Mariana Gosnell takes the reader along on her extraordinary voyage across the U.S. in her single-engine Luscombe Silvaire, Zero Three Bravo. Enticed by the ribbon of sky that she could see from her Manhattan office window, she took a leave of absence from her job and made a three-month solo flight, navigating by use of landmarks and landing in America's little-known, back-country airports. She traveled south from her home airport of Spring Valley, New York, down to North Carolina and Georgia, west across Texas to Los Angeles and north to San Francisco, and then east over the Rockies, the plains, and the farms of the Midwest until she was back home.

What results is a lyrical description of land, sky, and water interwoven with experiences among small-town folks, maverick crop-dusters, banner towers, mechanics, and airport loiterers. With each landing there is a story to be told: the deaf-mute pilot who grounded himself until the eggs in the bird's nest lodged in his plane's engine had hatched, the woman running an airport by herself after losing both her husband and son to flying accidents, and the pilots and "hangar bums" who tried to hide their surprise when they saw a woman pilot flying cross-country solo.

This true story -- including photos taken on the trip -- will make the confirmed urban dweller yearn for open spaces and the adventurous life.

About this title

About the Author:

Mariana Gosnell is a former medicine reporter for "Newsweek," Her articles have appeared in many magazines, including "Smithsonian" and "National Wildlife," She is the author of "Zero Three Bravo: Solo Across America in a Small Plane."
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From Kirkus Reviews:

A pleasurable ride with aviatrix Gosnell on her leisurely summer odyssey, flying in to out-of-the-way airfields and seeing the US from a fresh perspective. The lure of the blue sky outside her office window in midtown Manhattan finally proved irresistible to Gosnell. Taking a three- month leave of absence from her reporter's job at Newsweek, she set out in her small, single-engine Luscombe Silvaire to hop-skip-and- jump to the West Coast and back. Gosnell had fallen in love with flying during a summer vacation in Kenya when she took a charter flight over the game-rich African plains, and she extended her vacation there in order to take flying lessons. Back home, she finished her flight training and bought her first airplane--``a weekend cabin that moved.'' On the cross-country trip described here--flying below 1500 feet whenever the weather and terrain permitted, stopping off at familiar and unfamiliar places, dropping in on friends, hiking and backpacking when the mood struck, exploring caves, spending the nights in her sleeping bag and as often as not under the wing of her beloved little plane--Gosnell saw America as few do: the ocean shores, the Mississippi, the Rockies, the Great Plains, and terrain both benign and terrifying. The characters she met were as interesting as the sights--among them, crop-dusters, tow-plane pilots, fire spotters, flight instructors, trading-post managers, cave specialists, and, of course, the FBOs (fixed-base operators: the term stands for both the small, private airfields and the dedicated folk who run them). A notable stop on the way back was at Columbus, Ohio, for a homecoming visit with her family. A satisfying companion to Laurence Gonzales's One Zero Charlie (1992). Like Gonzales, Gosnell is hopelessly in love with flying, and we are ensnared by her enthusiasm. (Photographs--not seen). -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

About this edition

• Publisher: Touchstone
• Publication date: 1994
• ISBN 10: 0671892088
• ISBN 13: 9780671892081
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 384