Wang Zheng (pilot)
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| Wang Zheng | |
|---|---|
| Wang Zheng/Julie Wang | |
| Born | December 25, 1972 (age 44) |
| Nationality | Chinese |
| Aviation career | |
| World Records | First Chinese person to fly solo around-the-world; First Chinese woman to fly around-the-world. |
| First flight | March 10, 2011 |
| Famous flights | Solo Global Circumnavigation August 17 – September 19, 2016 |
| Website/Facebook | |
| www.flywithjulie.org/Fly With Julie | |
Wang Zheng (Chinese: 王争, English: Julie Wang; born 25 December 1972 in Chongqing) is an Airline Transport Pilot and Certified Flight Instructor (CFI) in Stuart, Florida, where she is Chief Flight Instructor for Zulutime Pilot, an FAA Part 141 flight school. She is the first Chinese to fly solo around the world.
Wang's parents were professors involved in aerospace research at the Harbin Institute of Technology and Wang was constantly surrounded by engineers and aerospace academics growing up on the university campus. In 1989, Wang's brother, Dou, was selected as one of two Harbin high school students to enter the PLA Air Force but Wang's parents refused to provide the family's household identification and registration booklet, effectively witholding their permission for him to become a pilot. They similarly witheld permission for Wang to become a flight attendant for Air China, feeling it more appropriate that Wang attend university and study computer science, which she did for two years before leaving to pursue a career in global advertising in Beijing.
Wang relocated to the United States with her husband and daughter in September 2010, obtained a driver's license and then began flying in March 2011. Her first flight was in weather so bad the flight school's instructors were amazed when she returned the following day to sign up for training. She obtained her private pilot's certificate in July 2011 and by late 2012 had become a multi-engine, instrument-rated commercial pilot. In 2013, she earned each of the three available flight instructor ratings (CFI, CFII and MEI) issued by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), and became the first Chinese citizen to earn an FAA flight instructor certificate.
In 2016, in partnership with Chang'an Ford Motor Company and Youlian Financial, Wang completed a solo circumnavigation of the globe in a single-engine airplane, becoming the first Chinese person to fly an airplane solo around the world. She departed from Addison, Texas on August 17, 2016, westbound and made stops in California, Hawaii, the Marshall Islands, Guam, the Philippines, China, Thailand, India, the UAE, Greece, Malta, Portugal, the Azores and Newfoundland, before returning to Texas on September 19th, thirty-three days later. Wang made the flight in a normally-aspirated Cirrus SR22 modified to hold extra fuel, and covered over ________ nautical-miles in 155 flying hours, over eighteen flight days.
On November 1, 2016, at Airshow China 2016 in Zhuhai, AOPA China's President Mr. Zhang Feng together with Board of Directors Member Chen Wei, presented Wang with a replica bank draft for 1,000,000 Yuan Renminbi (about $150,000) representing the 1,000,000 Yuan Renminbi prize AOPA China will award to Wang for being the first Chinese woman to complete an around-the-world flight.