Harold Gatty
"[1][2] In 1931, Gatty served as navigator, along with pilot Wiley Post, on the flight which set the record for aerial circumnavigation of the world, flying a distance of 15,747 miles (24,903 km) in a Lockheed Vega named the Winnie Mae, in 8 days, 15 hours and 51 minutes.In 1929, Gatty navigated a Lockheed Vega on a flight from Los Angeles to New York City for Nevada Airlines, in an effort to demonstrate the feasibility of coast-to-coast passenger service.In 1931, Wiley Post asked Gatty to accompany him on an effort to break the world record for circumnavigating the Earth, which was previously set at 21 days by the Graf Zeppelin airship.The journey began on 23 June 1931 at Roosevelt Field in New York and followed a 15,000-mile course across Europe, Russia, and Siberia, due to the lack of suitable airfields nearer the equator.They continued to Berlin, Moscow, and Khabarovsk, then crossed the Bering Sea, landing on the beach near Solomon, Alaska, then to Edmonton, Alberta, arriving back at Roosevelt Field after 8 days, 15 hours, and 51 minutes.In this book, Gatty gave a detailed account of a method of dead reckoning he invented that revolutionized the ability of navigators to fly safely through cloudy conditions, without drifting off course through cumulative errors.After obtaining leave from his military service as navigation instructor for the US Army, Gatty joined the leader of the expedition, Dr. Francis D. Coman, on the schooner Kinkajou.In November 1935, Noonan and Gatty embarked in the schooner Kinkajou to investigate Baker, Howland, and Jarvis islands and conduct meteorological observations.Gatty moved to Washington, D.C. in 1943 where he worked on a navigational supplement for a survival kit, for Air Force personnel flying over the Pacific in the event they should become castaways.[17] Gatty's original August 1957 preface to his manuscript clearly states that environmental pathfinding observations were only intended to supplement, never supplant the use of map and compass.