Fatal Flights of the Rich and Famous

Fame and fate intersect as aviation legends reveal perilous legacies and unfathomable risks.Everyone loves adventure, mystery and the notion of celebrity and this book combines all of these with new unpublished material, supported by high quality previously unpublished images. Aviation history is full of evocative stories about the evolution of aeroplanes; flying and the perils of air travel and there are many ways of looking at these. The theme of this book is to recall some of those perils through the eyes of twenty-three internationally-famous celebrity air travellers between 1919 and 2020. What brings them all together here is that, as well as presenting the personalities, the stories showcase aeroplanes from the golden age of biplanes to helicopters, biz-jets and airliners. They also illustrate the fallibility of people and technology, while giving a flavour of the social progress of air transport over the past 100 years. Sadly, the climax of these particular stories culminates in air crashes that took the lives of the celebrities involved. While the final selection of the stars might be open to debate, the breadth of celebrity representation in these stories is very wide, being drawn from the fields of aeronautics; cinema; exploration; fashion; music; politics and sport. Mysteries and myths have grown up around some of these incidents and while some of these can be debunked, others will pose unanswered questions. All, though, will demonstrate that Fame and Fortune alone are no protection from Fate.Table of ContentsChapter 1 Sir John Alcock: 19 December 1919Chapter 2 Roald Amundsen: 22 June 1928Chapter 3 Juan de la Cierva: 9 December 1936Chapter 4 Amelia Earhart: 2 July 1937Chapter 5 Amy Johnson: 5 January 1941Chapter 6 Carole Lombard: 16 January 1942Chapter 7 Leslie Howard: 1 June 1943Chapter 8 Glenn Miller: 15 December 1944Chapter 9 Roy Chadwick: 23 August 1947Chapter 10 Manchester United FC: 6 February 1958Chapter 11 Buddy Holly: 3 February 1959Chapter 12 Dag Hammarskjöld: 17 September 1961Chapter 13 June Thorburn: 4 November 1967Chapter 14 Yuri Gagarin: 27 March 1968Chapter 15 Rocky Marciano: 31 August 1969Chapter 16 Audie Murphy: 28 May 1971Chapter 17 Otto Lucas: 2 October 1971Chapter 18 Graham Hill: 29 November 1975Chapter 19 Francis Gary Powers: 1 August 1977Chapter 20 Payne Stewart: 25 October 1999Chapter 21 Hansie Cronje: 1 June 2002Chapter 22 Vittorio Missoni: 4 January 2013Chapter 23 Kobe Bryant: 26 January 2020 Read more