Teenage pilots fly in self-made plane From Cape to Cairo

Teenage pilots have achieved their goal of flying from Cape Town to Cairo in a self-made plane.

It took a group of 20 teenagers 10 days to build the four-seater Sling 4 plane which landed safely in Cairo on Monday.

Six young pilots were a part of the journey which aimed to inspire youth across the world to chase their dreams, and not be limited by their past.

Seventeen-year-old pilot Megan Werner, founder of the U-Dream Global project, said: “I wanted to do something bigger that will inspire people around the world. I’ve got a huge love for aviation because my mom is an aircraft engineer instructor and my dad is an airline pilot. When I heard about the initiative… I thought how about having 20 teenagers building a plane and then we fly it across Africa,” she said.

It was no easy feat, as the group encountered multiple challenges en route to Cairo.

“The support plane broke down and in Addis [Ababa] we had to do our own leg… and it was a 10-hour flight across Sudan. So, here are these teenagers flying across Sudan with no support plane following.”

They departed on 15 June and were expected to head back to South Africa on a commercial flight next week.