Pilot and Circumnavigator Arrived to Delhi
08.08.2018 / 12:08
During his more than 47 000 km long journey, Czech lawyer and pilot Roman Kramařík found his way to New Delhi. He has a challenge to be the first solo flying circumnavigator from the Czech Republic and calls his project „Mission winged lion“, dedicating the mission to celebrate the 100th Anniversary of the foundation of Czechoslovakia. During his journey, he tries to map Czech and Czechoslovak footprints, left by our fellow countrymen. And because we can find lots of these footprints in India, Roman Kramařík landed in New Delhi, where he paid his visit to the Embassy of the Czech Republic.
The flight around the world started Roman Kramařík at the Točná airport near the city of Plzeň. From there he flew over Serbia and Greece to Israel, where he found a lot of reminders of Czechoslovakia and the Czech Republic. Then he continued crossing the border point between Israel and Jordan called SALAM (Peace – Hebrew and Arabic) over the desert to Dubai and from his last stop in Karachi directly to New Delhi. The entire journey is being undertaken on one-engine Cessna 210P with iconic registration code OK – TGM (T.G.M. – initials of the first Czechoslovak president).
In New Delhi, the circumnavigator has had quite an intense program. During his visit, H. E. Milan Hovorka, Ambassador of the Czech republic, received him at the Embassy. That was followed by a discussion organised by the Embassy with expats, friends of the Czech Republic and Slovakia and aviation enthusiasts in general. The discussion was part of the celebration of the Czechoslovak anniversary and Mr Kramařík delivered a passionate and engaging speech about his mission and the friendship between former Czechoslovakia and India. While visiting the Czech footprints he couldn’t miss the headquarters of Bata India Ltd., mainly because a journey around the world done by J. A. Baťa was a great inspiration for Romans mission. He also met with the new top management of Home Credit India and made a short discussion with its employees. A lot of attention of the local media was raised by his visit to Punjab Aircraft Maintenance Engineering College in Patiala, where he held a lecture for future pilots. He then visited even more Czech footprints, such as the „Glass river“, donated to the Indira Gandhi memorial by Czechoslovakia.
The further journey will take circumnavigator to Kolkata and to Thailand followed by crossing the Pacific ocean, where he expects the longest part of his journey – flight to the USA. From there he’s going to go straight back to Europe, with just a short stop on some of the islands in the Atlantic ocean. His last refuelling will take place in London, from where he’ll take off to the last part of his journey – back to Prague.
Milan Dostál, Economic Diplomat, Embassy of the Czech Republic in Delhi