Daredevil veteran pilot in plea for help
Needs parts to fix plane and visa to leave South Sudan
JUBA // Veteran British pilot Maurice Kirk has had his share of mishaps flying vintage planes around the world, but even his maverick mettle was tested after crashing in wartorn South Sudan.
Mr Kirk, 71, was taking part in a rally flying vintage planes across Africa when he veered off course nearly two weeks ago, ending up in South Sudan instead of a town in Kenya across the border. It was the second time he went missing during the rally – whose organisers disqualified him for his antics: flying with an unfit aircraft and broken compass, and forgetting all his maps in a Khartoum hotel. Stricken with malaria in the South Sudanese capital Juba, Mr Kirk told of how he crash-landed in Kapoeta – the site of violent clashes in July between warring parties in the country – shortly after all the pilots were detained in Ethiopia for two days.
“I was headed for Lokichogio [ Kenya] and I simply ran out of daylight,” he said. “I think I was suffering from malaria then and I had difficulties as a pilot-in-command. I’m afraid I scratched her a little bit.”
The rough landing left the 1943 Piper Cub member with a broken propeller and other damage.
Mr Kirk said he was “generally attacked” by locals when they stumbled upon him, slapping him around and herding him into the police station.
“They put me in a cubbyhole with no water, no bucket and left the lights on, so the flies were everywhere,” he said.
“They kept me there for four or five days and every time the embassy rang, they would stand to attention with the phone and comb their hair.”
Mr Kirk recounted his adventures on his Facebook page, issuing pleas to save his plane and get spare parts shipped to him, while detailing his severe nausea and headaches before he was transported to Juba and diagnosed with malaria.
“Malaria frightened me a lot,” said the pilot who was injured in 2005 when he crash-landed in Japan on a solo bid to fly around the world in a vintage plane. He also crashed in the Caribbean in 2008.
As he struggles to get a visa to legalise his presence in South Sudan, his biggest fear is his plane will be stripped by locals.
“I fear that because it’s upended,” he said. “It’s an ideal slide for the local children.”