Amy Johnson Amy Johnson was born in Hull

Amy Johnson

Amy Johnson was born in Hull in 1903. She had three younger sisters called Irene, Molly and Betty. In 1927 she moved to London and, one day, she went to Stag Lane Airfield. She loved the aeroplanes and decided that she wanted to learn to be a pilot.

In 1929, after a lot of hard work, Amy got her Pilot’s ‘A’ Licence. To get her ‘B’ Licence she had to learn about navigation, Morse code and weather forecasting as well as flying 100 hours solo (by herself). She became the first female in the world to earn her Ground Engineer Licence which meant that she knew how to fix planes.

Amy decided that she wanted to do something really exciting. A man called Bert Hinkler had already flown a plane from England to Australia and Amy wanted to try and beat his time. Bert Hinkler had taken 15 days to complete his journey and Amy wanted to do it faster. She planned her journey using the quickest route possible.

On 5 May 1930, she took off from Croydon in her Gipsy Moth biplane which she called Jason. She flew 800 miles on her first day and landed in Vienna, Austria. On her second day, she got up at 4 am to fly to Constantinople (now Istanbul) in Turkey. It was a difficult flight with lots of fuel problems and Amy ended up covered in petrol.

She encountered many challenges along the way – it was not an easy journey. There were mountains to fly over, thick cloud to fly through and shark-infested waters to cross.

On the fourth day she had to land because of a desert storm where she sat on the tail of Jason to stop the plane being blown away. She eventually arrived in Baghdad, Iraq.

On the ninth day, Amy landed on a football field where the plane was damaged. She had to stay in the same place for two days while repairs were carried out. Would she still be able to get to Australia in less than 15 days?

She continued her journey, encountering all different kinds of weather, including blistering heats and monsoons. Each time she landed, she needed to carry out repairs and maintenance on Jason. Sometimes, she was lucky to have people to help her.

When she landed in Indonesia on the 16 th day, she had to stay there for the next day while repairs were again carried out on her plane. By now she knew that she had not beaten Bert Hinkler’s time but she was determined to finish her journey anyway.

She was very worried when she landed on the last Indonesian island, just 500 miles from Australia, as she was soon surrounded by a group of native people who were all carrying knives. However, these people were very kind and gave her food and somewhere to sleep.

Finally, on the 20 th day, she started the last part of her journey. On Saturday 24 May 1930 at 3. 30 pm, Amy and Jason landed in Darwin, Australia. Amy had not beaten Bert Hinkler’s time but she had become the first woman to fly solo from England to Australia.

A few years later saw the start of the Second World War. Amy joined the ATA (Air Transport Auxiliary) and flew planes from the factories to the air bases where they were needed. Amy Johnson is still remembered for her remarkable flight from England to Australia more than 90 years later.