Aviation Biography

A Saint Who Defied Gravity and Touched the Heavens Step into the breathtaking life of St. Joseph of Cupertino, the humble friar whose faith lifted him—both spiritually and physically—beyond the bounds of this world. From the moment of his birth, Joseph’s path was marked by hardship, rejection, and relentless trials, yet through his unwavering trust in God, he transformed suffering into sanctity. His life was a paradox—misunderstood by many, ridiculed by his peers, and scrutinized by the Church, yet chosen by heaven to manifest some of the most astonishing miracles ever recorded in ...

Paul Tremelling was just seven years old when he watched the Royal Navy's Sea Harriers leave their home base in Somerset to do battle against the Argentine Air Force in the Falklands War. Two decades later, he would join this exclusive club, one of an elite band of Fleet Air Arm fighter pilots, charged with standing in the way of Her Majesty's enemies. This is the story of what it takes to make it in the dog-eat-dog arena of fighter combat. In the cockpit or crew room, the pressure is relentless, the humour merciless. It's no place for the faint-hearted.

From the young airmen who took their frail machines high above the trenches of World War I and fought their foes in single combat, there emerged a renowned company of brilliant aces - among them Ball, Bishop, McCudden, Collishaw, and Mannock - whose legendary feats have echoed down half a century. But behind the elite pilots in the Royal Flying Corps, there were many hundreds of airmen who flew their hazardous daily sorties in outdated planes without ever achieving fame.

Sherman Lead is the gripping story of a year flying the F-4 in combat during the Vietnam War, told through the eyes of a fighter pilot. Operating out of Ubon Royal Thai Air Base, Thailand in 1968-69, Gail Peck and his squadronmates in the 433rd Tactical Fighter Squadron of the 8th Tactical Fighter Wing were tasked with flying combat missions into North Vietnam and Laos. The F-4 was heavily involved in the air-to-ground mission at this time, with targets being well defended by enemy anti-aircraft artillery and surface-to-air missiles.

Don't worry about your tray table and seat back for this one. Forget what you've been told about the romantic notion of the airline business. It's not like what you've seen in the movies. Buckle your seat belt and join Captain Kimber C. Turner for a flight over a thirty year career of ups and downs in aviation. This story of his love/hate life in airplanes will take you from laughter to livid and back again.

Never Have Your Dog Stuffed, filled with curiosity about nature, good humor, and honesty, is the crowning achievement of an actor, author, and director, but surprisingly, it is the story of a life more filled with turbulence and laughter than any Alda has ever played on the stage or screen.

On January 15, 2014, LT Kegan "SMURF" Gill nearly lost his life in the fastest survived ejection in naval aviation history. He's spent every day since fighting to reclaim his mental, physical, and spiritual health—and now, he's encouraging other veterans to join the fight alongside him.

In this inspirational autobiography, Captain "Sully" Sullenberger, the airline pilot whose emergency landing on the Hudson River earned the world's admiration, tells his life story and talks about the essential qualities that he believes have been so vital to his success.

Before COVID, both Qantas and its CEO Alan Joyce were flying high, the darlings of customers, staff and investors. After Covid hit, only money mattered—in particular, the company’s share price and extraordinary executive bonuses. Illegally redundant workers, unethical flight credits, abysmal customer service, antique aircraft: these became Qantas’ new brand. How did things go so badly wrong? For the first time, The Chairman’s Lounge tells the full story of how one company banked the nation’s loyalty and then cashed in on it.

747 is the thrilling story behind "the Queen of the Skies" - the Boeing 747 - as told by Joe Sutter, one of the most celebrated engineers of the 20th century, who spearheaded its design and construction. Sutter's vivid narrative takes us back to a time when American technology was cutting-edge and jet travel was still glamorous and new. With wit and warmth, he gives an insider's sense of the larger than life-size personalities - and the tensions - in the aeronautical world.

Europe has fallen. Pearl Harbor is in flames. Enter: the Eighth. In 1941 the RAF fought a desperate battle of survival against the Luftwaffe over Britain. Then, from across the Atlantic, came a new generation of American pilots, gunners, and bombardiers, a new generation of flying machines called the B-17 Flying Fortress, the B-24 Liberator, the P-47 Thunderbolt, and the P-51 Mustang fighter.

Aviation Trivia Hero is a book of 101 questions and fun facts on space and air history and trivia. Enjoy this book on a family fun night, game night, or car ride, or use it to review before your local pub trivia night.

Devotion tells the inspirational story of the U.S. Navy’s most famous aviation duo, Lieutenant Tom Hudner and Ensign Jesse Brown, and the Marines they fought to defend. A white New Englander from the country-club scene, Tom passed up Harvard to fly fighters for his country. An African American sharecropper’s son from Mississippi, Jesse became the navy’s first Black carrier pilot, defending a nation that wouldn’t even serve him in a bar.

‘Without Precedent’ is the military biography of army commando and fighter pilot, Phillip Zupp. One man who served in two very different wars. During World War Two, he saw combat on the ground in the Pacific before patrolling Hiroshima and Tokyo at the war’s end. In Korea, Phillip flew 201 combat sorties amid intense ground fire and the ever-threatening MiG fighters. Peace brought an aviation career that spanned the globe and the skies above it. All the while, aviation history had overlooked this intriguing story of the search for a downed airman, a damaged jet and the first ...

Between the world wars, no sport was more popular, or more dangerous, than airplane racing. Thousands of fans flocked to multi-day events, and cities vied with one another to host them. The pilots themselves were hailed as dashing heroes who cheerfully stared death in the face. Fly Girls recounts how a cadre of women banded together to break the original glass ceiling: the entrenched prejudice that conspired to keep them out of the sky.

The Few tells the dramatic and unforgettable story of eight young Americans who joined Britain's Royal Air Force, defying their country's neutrality laws and risking their U.S. citizenship to fight side-by-side with England's finest pilots in the summer of 1940—over a year before America entered the war. Flying the lethal and elegant Spitfire, they became "knights of the air" and with minimal training but plenty of guts, they dueled the skilled and fearsome pilots of Germany's Luftwaffe. By October 1940, they had helped England win the greatest air battle in the history of aviation.

It was 13 October 1972. Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571, carrying a team of young rugby players, their families and friends, took off for the very last time. A deadly miscalculation saw F571 crash directly into the Andean mountains to devastating consequences: the body of the plane broke violently into two, its floor torn to smithereens; seats flew out of the air taking passengers with them. In the weeks that followed, the remaining people who were on board - the society of the snow - emerged to fight a dire, gruelling battle for survival.

Amelia Earhart’s autobiographical book The Fun of It: Random Records of My Own Flying and of Women in Aviation covers Earhart’s life through May 20-21, 1932, “when Miss Earhart, alone in a Lockheed Vega monoplane with a single Wasp engine, negotiated 2,026 miles through storm and fog from Harbor Grace, Newfoundland, to a cow pasture on the outskirts of Londonderry, Ireland. The flight set a transatlantic record of 14 hours, 56 minutes...and stirred such public adulation that she confided, ‘I’ll be glad when the zoo part is over.’” (ANB)

In Ted W. Lawson’s classic Thirty Seconds over Tokyo, Lawson gives a vivid eyewitness account of the unorthodox assignment that 85 intrepid volunteer airmen - the “Tokyo Raiders” - under the command of celebrated flier James H. Doolittle executed in April 1942. The plan called for 16 B-25 twin-engine medium bombers of the Army Air Corps to take off from the aircraft carrier Hornet, bomb industrial targets in Japan, and land at airfields in China.

Amelia Earhart was a woman of many "firsts." In 1932, she became the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean. In 1935, she also became the first woman to fly across the Pacific. From her early years to her mysterious 1937 disappearance while attempting a flight around the world, listeners will find Amelia Earhart's life a fascinating story.