Matt Thurber, editor-in-chief at AIN Media Group, has been flying since 1975 and writing about aviation since 1978 and now has the best job in the world, running editorial operations for Aviation International News, Business Jet Traveler, and FutureFlight.aero. In addition to working as an A&amp;P mechanic on everything from Piper Cubs to turboprops, Matt taught flying at his father’s flight school in Plymouth, Mass., in the early 1980s, flew for an aircraft owner/pilot, and for two summer seasons hunted swordfish near the George’s Banks off the East Coast from a Piper Super Cub. An ATP certificated fixed-wing pilot and CFII and commercial helicopter pilot, Matt is type-rated in the Citation 500 and Gulfstream V/550. Based in the Pacific Northwest, Matt and his team cover the entire aviation scene including business aircraft, helicopters, avionics, safety, manufacturing, charter, fractionals, technology, air transport, advanced air mobility, defense, and other subjects of interest to AIN, BJT, and FutureFlight readers.

Editor-in-Chief

Matt Thurber

Twenty-five years ago, Tom Casey entered the unwritten record books by completing the first and only flight around the world in a single-engine seaplane operating only from water. The extraordinarily challenging and troublesome journey was never recognized by the National Aeronautic Association, the U.S. organization that sanctions records, but it deserves attention nevertheless, not just because it had never been done before but also because the flight surmounted huge setbacks, and succeeded both because of and in spite of Casey’s bull-headed approach to flying. The chief facilitator of the flight, William Coleman, has finally finished writing a book about the perilous and expensive venture.

 


Floatplane Odyssey, edited by aviation writer John Infanger, former editorial director for Airport Business magazine, made its debut at the EAA AirVenture show in Oshkosh in July. At a press conference there, Casey and Coleman shared the stage with Jack Hammond, former head of Phillips 66 Aviation, which sponsored the ill-fated but ultimately successful journey.

 


Casey was 53 years old when he made the round-the-world trip. Initially he planned to fly west to east, but after failing to obtain permission to fly through Russia he reversed course and flew east. The airplane was a Cessna 206 on floats made by Wipaire, which underwrote some of the costs. But Phillips 66 bore the brunt of the expenses and ended up spending hundreds of thousands of dollars.

 


The entire trip took 188 days instead of the projected 60. Delay after delay bogged down the journey. Many of those, according to Coleman, were caused by a lack of communication from Casey, which spawned a phrase found frequently throughout the book: “Where the hell is Casey?” Another problem was Casey’s optimistic but probably misguided belief that doors would open for him. While this did happen in many countries, some–especially Russia–resisted all efforts to permit the 206 to fly through.

 


Surprises peppered the flight, such as major back surgery provided by kind Saudi Arabian hosts during the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, and a catastrophic engine failure after a chief Phillips 66 oil chemist had flagged a bad oil sample. Nevertheless, Casey saw it through and alighted on Lake Washington, Seattle, on Dec. 18, 1990.

 


<h2>What Was He Thinking?</h2>

 


The book is fascinating, although at times tough to read because Coleman is unsparing in detail about what went wrong and right during the trip. The reader is left wondering how Casey managed to survive so many harrowing events, among them typhoons, “house arrest,” bribes to aviation ministers and “sneaking” through Japan without permission. Sometimes while reading I wanted to wring Casey’s neck and ask him, “What were you thinking?” Coleman’s frustration while trying to help Casey complete the odyssey comes through clearly. “It was a long and tedious journey,” Coleman admitted at AirVenture. “Why did I write the book? Because Tom never got the recognition he deserved.”

 


Hammond expanded: “When I told Bill Coleman he would be responsible for this flight, I told him to do whatever he had to do to make it happen. And Coleman did exactly that. Some of it was unorthodox and not in the Phillips 66 playbook, but Coleman got Casey through to the end.”

 


“You’ve just got to sweat it out and hope it works for you,” Casey concluded.

Book Review: Floatplane Odyssey Documents Record-breaking Flight

Although not recognized by officials, Tom Casey’s floatplane flight around the world was truly a record-breaking adventure. 

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