Faster Than the Sun: The Compelling Story of a Record-Breaking Test Pilot and WWII Navy Flyer

The name of Peter Twiss first achieved national prominence in March 1956 when, as a test pilot, he gained the World Air Speed Record in the Fairey Delta 2, flying at a speed of 1132 mph over Chichester in Sussex.

Seventeen years earlier, in 1939, he had joined the Fleet Air Arm to serve his country in war, seeing action in Fulmars over the convoys to Malta in June 1942, in Seafires during the Operation Torch landings in NW Africa, and as a night fighter flying Mosquitoes.

This new edition of Faster Than the Sun recounts his hitherto unpublished war experiences, based on his log book, and reproduces word for word the compelling story of his struggle to break the thousand miles per hour barrier, which has been described as one of the epic accounts of high-speed flight.

Lionel Peter Twiss, OBE, DSC and Bar (23 July 1921 – 31 August 2011) was a British test pilot who held the World Air Speed Record as the first man to fly at a speed greater than 1,000 mph.