Fourteen-year-old Sara Striker has completed her first-ever solo flight, making her one of the youngest student pilots in Canada – learning how to fly before getting a driver’s license.
Some of Stiker’s first memories are on a plane. The Warman teenager got the inspiration from her father and his floatplane at the young age of two.
Her dad, a pilot himself, later showed her the ropes at age 10 when he finally let go of the controls and allowed Striker to take over.
"I thought like, 'holy crap I’m actually flying this,'" she said.
Fast forward to 2019 – Striker has entered a very distinct category being one of the youngest people in North America to fly solo.
She spent much of her summer in the cockpit of a Cessna training at Millennium Aviation in Saskatoon to prepare for the big test.
Her first solo-flight was nerve-wracking.
"I was nervous as heck the night before and the day of but then when I got in the plane it all kind of washed away," she said.
It was also nail biting for her mother.
"I could see that Sara was very nervous, so I told her to take deep breaths and then i realized myself that I should probably be taking deep breaths as well," Christine Striker laughed.
Striker is qualified as student pilot, which means she can fly solo or with an instructor.
She’ll have to wait until her 16th birthday to qualify as an actual pilot, with passengers, something she says really would be a sweet 16.
