Mansoor – in the training flight

Mansoor Anis, an Indian expat and resident of Sharjah, hailing from Ujjain, has set a world record of becoming the youngest pilot.

Mansoor at AAA Langley – after completing his first solo flight

Mansoor, flew a Cessna 152 solo at the age of 14, on August 30, in a minimum flying training time of 25 hours, breaking the then existing German record of 15, and US kid of 14 with a minimum flying training  time of 34 hours.  Mansoor is a Class 9 student of Delhi Private School, Sharjah.

Having trained initially under the guidance of Quaid Johar Faizee, his maternal uncle, Mansoor developed a keen interest in flying and made it a point to study theory and practice to become the world’s youngest pilot.  Mansoor’s father, Ali Asghar Anis works at a private hospital in Sharjah and hails from Nagpur, while his mother Muneera is a teacher and hails from Ujjain.

Quaid, Mansoor’s uncle is a professional pilot and has developed a custom flight simulator, which he designed on his own using parts from a Boeing and computerizing the entire assembly.  It was this simulator which was the stepping stone for Mansoor in his tryst to fly at a young age.

Pilot Log Book for Mansoor

As per Quaid, the family, understanding the interest that this child had developed at such a young age, looked across the globe for a suitable training ground for Mansoor and narrowed down to Vancouver, where Mansoor was trained under the able guidance of Robert Wickins, Chief Instructor at AAA Langley flying institute.  Robert reviewed the skills that this child had developed and his sharp understanding of theory and expressed his evaluation to the family, agreeing to train Mansoor to fly.  Mansoor travelled to Vancouver with his mother during his summer holidays this year, to train under Robert Wickins.

In the earlier days, as per Quaid, when Mansoor used to visit India, he used to spend his entire vacation training with the simulator and reading theory.  Quaid, on his bi-monthly commercial flying trips to Sharjah, used to spend a couple of days with Mansoor and evaluate his performance and learning and plan the exercises for the next couple of months.  Communicating through WhatsApp and lessons through Skype, Quaid used to send YouTube lessons and theory material to Mansoor, which the child used to go through before the next evaluation.

Mansoor was 13 years an eleven months when the family flew to Vancouver to join Robert at AAA Langley.  Fighting against odds like bad weather, forest fires, Mansoor achieved the flying feat on 30 August just two days before they were scheduled to leave Canada as his school  was reopening  Robert trained him during his stay at Vancouver, briefed him on how the plane works, taught turning, stalling, spiraling, dive, etc.  Mansoor says that Robert assured him that nothing would go wrong and the aircraft can be controlled.  Assured and self confident, Mansoor finally took off and landed from Langley Regional Airport in Canada.  His flight time was 10 minutes, in which he taxied the aircraft from the hangar to the runway, took off, flew 5 minutes and landed back at the airport.

Mansoor receiving his certificate from Robert Wickins

Quaid, who is the motivation behind this achievement, has earlier trained his niece Zahabia Faizy helping her become one of  the youngest Indian female to fly solo at the age of 16,  He applied the same philosophy, motivation and technique on Mansoor and now is training his 7 year old son Mudrik Faizy to fly, again using the same simulator.

Mansoor says that his inspiration had been his uncle Quaid, who has inspired him to be a commercial pilot after completing school.  He aims to return to Canada for completing his training, intending to procure a recreational pilot . Interestingly seeing sister and brother success Muhammad, Zahabia s brother  has started practicing for car racing.  As per Quaid, there is a vast world out there, but parents look at main stream activities and domain areas, which limits the ambitions of children since other professionals seem to far placed and training options are costly and unidentifiable due to lack of resources.  However, citing the example of car racing, Quaid says, that though the finances required for this field are high, funding seeks talent and talent attracts funding – so sponsorship is always available for passionate, talented and motivated children.