Olga Pérez Antúnez is the first and only Spanish wing walker - something that was all the craze in the US during the 1920s & 30s. She has been doing it since 2013 and will be present at the Motril Air Show.
It takes some guts to climb up onto the upper wing of a biplane, even with a safety harness – and strike poses whilst the aircraft carries out aerobatics such as rolls and loops. But she does it and will be doing it on the 9th of June at the XVIII Festival Aéreo de Motril.
During the First World War a pilot might have to stand up in the cockpit or climb higher to clear a jam in the wing-mounted machine guns… and the British during that war didn’t wear parachutes because the top brass thought that it would encourage cowardice!
Legend has it that in 1918 a US army pilot, Ormer Locklear, developed a mechanical problem in the air. Locklear climbed out onto the lower wing of the plane to fix the problem making him the first wingwalker. After the war he formed the Locklear Flying Circus along with two ex-military buddies and before long their stunts had kick-started a craze.
One-hundred years later, they still use biplanes to carry out these stunts – well, you wouldn’t do it in a jet, obviously, would you!
Olga Pérez Antúnez saw photos of the era and learnt of Margaret Stivers, from California. She actually met this retired, American wing walker and they became friends. Then in 2013 she went to Britain and tried it out for herself. When she landed the pilot offered her a job as a wing walker and she hasn’t look back… well she has looked back, literally when she bends over backwards with one leg in the air and looks at the tail of the aircraft.
Being a pioneer in wing walking in Spain, it has taken a lot of preparation, paperwork and convincing authorities that it’s safe. Of course, it’s not just a case of flopping about on the top wing until the pilot gets bored because there is a lot of preparation, both mental and physical. A lot of practice takes place on the ground and working out with the pilot the coordination, etc.
(News/Noticias: Motril, Costa Tropical, Granada, Andalucia)