Aussie Honoured
27/08/12
Two weeks after suffering a heart attack, an Australian developer of the modern hang glider learned he had been awarded one of aeronautics’ top prizes. John Dickenson will receive the 2012 Federation Aeronautique Internationale (FAI) gold air medal in Antalya, Turkey in October. Mr Dickenson says he can only describe the switch from nearly dying to global recognition of his aircraft as “strange”.
The 78-year-old suffered his heart attack around six weeks ago, was told first of his nomination in hospital, and then learned of his honour two weeks after the life-threatening event - ”Having just survived a heart attack, and to be alive to accept and appreciate this thing, is an earth-shaking event.”
A self-confessed aviation nut from childhood, Mr Dickenson executed the first flight of the first controllable hang glider was in September 1963 at Grafton on the NSW north coast. The Aussie said he was ”awestruck” when he realised in the air what he’d done, rushing home to write a patent application called “improved gliding apparatus”.
Sadly, a change in work circumstances and a return to Sydney two years later meant Mr Dickenson lacked the money to complete the patent application. The Dickenson glider improved on the original model developed by Otto Lilienthal. The German flew a small distance before crashing and dying in his model in 1896.
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