It is interesting to notice that some people
spring up from debilitating
disability and
work their way through a thousand obstacles.
If we want it and dream
about it...there's nothing that's going to stop
us.
In fact, most of the important things in the world that
we enjoy today, have been accomplished by people
who have kept on trying when there seemed to be
no hope at all.
Here's a true story
(shared by Mario Villalobos of Makati, City,
Philippines)
of a
woman who denied the odds,
accepted the situation gracefully and happily
and hurdled the challenges of having no arms and
be an inspiration to millions of people.
Jessica Cox, a girl born without arms from Tucson,
Arizona got the Sport Pilot certificate recently
and became the first
pilot licensed to fly using
only her feet.
Jessica was born without arms, but
that has not stopped her from doing what she
loves to do.
Her latest flight into the seemingly impossible
dream is becoming the first pilot licensed to fly
using only her feet.
With one foot manning the controls and the other
delicately guiding the steering column, Cox soared
to achieve a Sport Pilot certificate qualifying her to fly a light-sport
aircraft to altitudes of 10,000 feet.
“She’s a good pilot. She’s rock solid,“ said
Parrish Traweek, the flying instructor at
San Manuel’s Ray Blair Airport.
Parrish Travweek runs PC Aircraft Maintenance
and Flight Services and has trained many pilots,
some of whom didn’t come close to Cox’s
abilities. “When she came up here driving a
car,” Travwwek recalled, “I knew she’d have no
problem flying a plane.”
Doctors never learned why she was born without
arms, but she figured out early on that she
didn’t want to use prosthetic devices.
Jessica Cox, earned a licnese to fly
airplanes on October 10 2008. She also has two
black belts in Tae Kwan-Do, a college degree in
Psychology, and a thriving career as a
motivational speaker. Jessica has no arms, but
this bilateral congenital limb
deficiency doesn’t stop her from achieving and
surpassing her goals. From birth on, her feet
became her hands. She can drive a car, type 25
words per minute, and fly an airplane using her
feet, without any special adaptations.
“I highly encourage people with disabilities to
consider flying," She said. “It helps reverse
the sterotype that people with disabilities are
powerless to believe that they are powerful
and capable of setting high goals and achieving
them.” Jessica earned her Sport Pilot
certificate after training with Able Flight, a
North Carolina flight training company that
specializes in helping people with disabilities
learn to fly. She won an Able Flight
scholarship and was able to train with
instructor Parrish Traweek free of charge.
Sometimes we do not have
to follow where the path may
lead, but go where there is no path, and leave a
trail. Related story:
The Dog Called Faith.
To
get something
we never had, we have to do something we never
did. Our
greatest glory consists not in never falling, but in rising
every time we fall.
|
Tim
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