A 62-year-old Swiss adventurer who was attempting to fly around the world in an LSA-sized aircraft died Saturday in an accident in Ecuador. Eric Guilloud’s Aerospool WT9 Dynamic aircraft hit a volcano shortly after takeoff from Latacunga airport, south of Quito. Guilloud was trying to fly around the world in a series of sidetracking flights that would have seen him fly a total of 47,000 miles. He was planning to take 20 months for the trip and was raising money to fund orthopedic surgeries in the West African country of Burkina Faso. The flight was also in memory of a friend who died in a plane crash.
Guilloud planned to visit 34 countries on his trip. He was a lifelong pilot who was the Swiss hanggliding champion in 1976. “And now at 62, he chose to fly over the mountains and oceans from his ultralight airplane,” said a statement from Ecuador’s Director General of Civil Aviation. The aircraft is a Slovakian design that is available as an LSA in the U.S. with fixed gear. Guilloud’s had the retractable gear option.
