Solo Flights around the World

Let's fly."
Max Conrad.

Maximilien Conrad is more famous for his extremely long flights and his records, than for his 'round the world' flight. In his round the World flight he set a record that is still unbeaten to this day. This flight was not flown solo, as he had an observer of the NAA on board, the American representative of the FAI. I must therefore bend my own rule of only describing solo flights around the World in order to pay tribute to Max Conrad, a very remarkable general aviation pilot. Conrad may have had company on his World Flight, but he was solo in all the long record-setting flights. Sitting in a cramped cockpit among fuel tanks and other gear, it is incredible that he was able to last so long in the air.

Maximilien Conrad was born on January 21, 1903, in Winona Minnesota, in the USA, and was raised in the strict German catholic tradition. He was fond of sports and competed in a lot of athletics. He was very impressed by Lindbergh's flight across the Atlantic in 1927.

Conrad learned to fly in the same year. In 1928, he bought his first airplane: a Swallow, and started to give flying lessons. In 1929, following a joy flight, one of his passengers alighted from the aircraft toward the front of the machine, and although Max tried to stop her, they were both hit by the spinning propeller. The young woman was killed instantly, and Conrad received a fractured skull which resulted in him taking years to regain his speech and normal motions. Religious and sporting groups were in a large way responsible for helping Conrad make his recovery.

In 1931, Conrad married Betty Biesanz. Slowly, he reopened his flying school and gradually his operations increased, including some transport and charter flights. The Government put him in charge of organising a series of flying schools: the Civil Pilot Training scheme. After the Pearl harbour attack, these schools became military flying schools.

Conrad experienced both good and bad fortunes during and after the war. In 1942, his hangar and all his aircraft were burned to the ground. In 1943 he became Chief Pilot for the Honeywell Company in Minneapolis. Just three years after the war, in 1948, Betty and the children went to live in Switzerland in the hope of cheaper living expenses than those in the U.S. With two aims in mind, Conrad decided to fly across the Atlantic. His first aim was to visit his family at a lesser cost than by sailing on the Queen Mary as he had done in 1948, and secondly to promote the new Piper Pacer whose sales were stagnant. The flight in N7330K was not an easy one, with American authorities in Greenland thinking him to be a communist spy. Finally Conrad was freed, and he landed at Toussus le Noble, south of Paris and spent September with his family. He now had nine children, including young Fransesco whom he had not yet seen. Betty and the children finally returned to the States on the liner Liberté .

The flight across the Atlantic in the Pacer was the start of a long partnership with William Piper.

The next stroke of ill fortune to strike Conrad was the Winona Experience, from the name of the town, where Conrad was living. The project was to revive the enthusiasm in young people interested in a flying career, and have them build their own aircraft, as a way of learning about aviation. The project was abandoned after two years, and Conrad was ruined, forcing him to send his family back to Switzerland in order to survive.

Financial rescue came in 1954 when Piper asked him to make a ferry flight in their new twin engine aircraft, the Apache. The flight, in order to attract the maximum of publicity, was to be done by a single pilot and without stops. Such flight had not taken place since Lindbergh's famous flight in 1927. Conrad started in Idlewild to arrive at Toussus le Noble after a flight of 23 hours 32 minutes, taking 10 hours 5 minutes out of Lindbergh's time. The success of the flight pushed up the Apache sales, and Conrad successfully ferried several of them and became Piper's ferry pilot. On March 6,1959, Conrad was celebrating his fiftieth Atlantic crossing by ferrying a single engine Piper Comanche with a 250 HP engine from Chicago to Rome in 33 hours 3 minutes. The road to endurance and distance records was open for Conrad.

His aim was to beat two existing records: Bill Odom in 1949, Honolulu to Teterboro (New Jersey), distance 5000 miles; and Pat Boling in 1958, Manila to Pendleton (Oregon), distance 7000 miles. He planned to fly from Casablanca to El Paso (Texas). After long preparations and many modifications to the aircraft, a Piper Comanche PA-24-250, N110LF, he was finally ready. The letters "LF" came from Conrad's motto: "Let's Fly". The agreement with Piper was that he would own the aircraft if the flight was successful. There were a few minor problems on the way to Casablanca, and Conrad had to wait several days for the right winds. Finally, on June 2nd, 1959, he took off from Casablanca heavily overloaded, just clearing the airport fence. Conrad had his own theory regarding the best altitude for long flights, preferring to fly very low, at less than 100 feet, and climbing to 500 feet at night for safety. He believed the engines to be more efficient at low level, saying that too much fuel is wasted in climbing to higher levels. Clifton Tait also favoured flying at very low levels in his many ferry flights. Overhead El Paso, Conrad had been in the air for 44 hours and still had a good quantity of fuel. He decided to continue to Los Angeles where he still had one hour of fuel left. He had been flying for 58 hours and had covered 7 668 miles. This record, in the C1-D Class ( Aircraft from 3858 lbs to less than 6614 lbs), was held for a very long time before being superseded.

Conrad, sometimes called "the Flying Grand Father", a title he did not really like, now had a taste for records. Between his ferry flights, he was preparing more records. He changed the 250 HP engine on his Comanche for a smaller 180 HP engine, which made the aircraft slightly slower, burning less fuel, but enabling him to fly further. Sheila Scott was also to change her engine for a smaller one. Conrad was able to reduce the amount of fuel to be carried, enabling him to fly in the C1-C Class ( between 2204 lbs to less than 3858 lbs). On November 24 1959, Conrad set a distance record between Casablanca and El Paso covering 6966 miles This record still stands today.

On July 14, 1960, Conrad set another record, this time a closed circuit between Minneapolis, Des Moines and Chicago in seven laps, covering 6921 miles. This record still stands today. In November of the same year, the Comanche was damaged in an accident caused by an engine failure on take off. In 1961, Conrad flew around the World. He used a Piper Aztec PA-23, fitted with two Lycoming engines of 250 HP each. The aircraft was named New Frontiers and the registration was N4445P. On board was Richard Jennings as observer from the National Aeronautic Association, the American representative of the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale ( FAI). Departing on February 27th, the route was to take them from Miami to Long Beach (California), Honolulu, Wake Island, Guam Island, Manilla (Philippines), Singapore, Bombay, Nairobi, Lagos (Nigeria), Dakar, Amapa (Brazil), Atkinson Field (British Guyana), and the Port of Spain (Trinidad), returning on March 8th, 1961. The average speed was 123 mph. Only a few incidents were experienced during the flight. The audio on the ADF died shortly after leaving Honolulu, and they started to turn back until Conrad discovered that it was only the speaker audio that was not operating. The audio on the headphones remained operative, so they resumed the flight. Another time, while changing fuel tanks sometime after Bombay, and with an altitude of only 100 feet, Conrad accidentally turned the fuel to the "OFF" position, resulting in both engines stopping. Fortunately, once restored to the proper tanks, the engines fired and came back to life. Between Lagos and Dakar, Conrad became nauseated and lost all sense of orientation and time, and they went off course. They also experienced problems where several NDB's had different Morse identifications to those published, and finally they were forced to make a precautionary landing at Amapa in the amazonian jungle, as they feared a shortage of fuel. Luck was with them when it turned out too be a Brazilian military base, where they managed to get fuel, and were then allowed to leave for British Guyana.

In 1964, Conrad set another long distance record between Capetown and Saint Petersburg (California), a distance of 7878 miles. The aircraft was a Twin Comanche fitted with two engines of 250 HP. The flights lasted 3 days and 2 nights.

Conrad wanted to set yet another record, that being to fly around the World via the two Poles. He choose another Piper Aztec: Saint Louis Woman, registration N123LF. The letters "LF", once again representing his motto "Let's Fly".

Between September 6 and 7, 1968, the new aircraft was used to set another record in closed circuit around Saint Louis (Missouri), a distance of 5312 miles.

Finally, after long preparations, and modifications to the aircraft, Conrad took off from Saint Louis on November 1st, 1968. He stopped in Calgary (Canada) and Fairbanks (Alaska). There he found an American weather station at Point Barrow reporting on the weather in the far north. It is at Point Barrow that Wiley Post came to grief in 1935. From there, Conrad went to T3, a weather station depending of Point barrow. T3 was on a floating iceberg, and from there, to the North Pole. Conrad diverted from his original plan to go to Tromsö (Norway) and went to Nord (Greenland). He stayed there 2 days waiting for more clement weather, then flew to Akureyri in Iceland, then Paris, and Casablanca. After Abijan, Conrad crossed the Atlantic and spent a week in Buenos Aires. From Punta Arenas (Chili), he made a first attempt toward the British base on Adelaide Island, making it on the second attempt. After a very long wait for the weather, Conrad finally decided to give up and return to the States, arriving in Saint Louis on January 21, 1969. It was his birthday, and he was 66 years old.

After long negotiations with the American Navy who wanted to prevent him from going again, and thanks to the intervention of Senator Barry Goldwater, Conrad was finally granted permission to land at the South Pole. This time he took off from Winona on November 30, 1969. After Honolulu, he was forced to land on Johnson atoll, an American military base to repair one alternator. Between Tarawa and Brisbane, when the left engine lost its oil pressure, he diverted on one engine to Espiritu Santo in the New Hebrides. After repairs, he went to New Zealand where he had to follow instructions from officers of the American Navy, and finally arrived at the South Pole on January 21st, 1970. His was the first civilian aircraft to land at the Pole and it was also his 67th birthday. With an altitude of 9400 feet and the amount of fuel he had to carry to reach his next stop, Mac Murdo Base, his chances of being able to take off were very slim. He had to wait for the green light from the Navy. The weather did improve, but during the long briefing given by the Navy, the weather closed in once more. When finally he could take off, the fog was covering the base again. The sky and the snow were of the same white. He tried to stay in the centre of the runway, marked by empty drums. He took off but a few instants later as he was slowly gaining high, listening to the radar operator, the left propeller hit a snow bank. He tried to turn around but the aircraft fell in the snow. The pilot was not hurt but the Aztec was beyond repair. Conrad returned to Winona with defeat in his heart. The aircraft stayed at the Pole. He was not to try again to fly around the Poles.

Conrad went back to the Piper factory and resumed ferrying aircraft. He had been dreaming of a last long flight : to reproduce the flight of the idol of his youth, Lindbergh. With his repaired Comanche, rechristened Spirit of Chicagoland, he repeated the famous flight at the same dates and the same airfields.

In 1965, Max Conrad received the prestigious Harmon Trophy, the most coveted of aviation awards. He also received the Paul Tissandier Medal from the FAI, and was appointed Honorary Colonel in the US Air Force. Lastly, the Winona Airport, in the town where he was born, was named "Max Conrad Field".

Max Conrad died in 1979. He had accumulated more than 50 000 flying hours.