The oldest active pilot?

Instrumental in the growth of general aviation in Spain, Laureano Ruiz Liaño is a living piece of European aviation heritage

- Biel Gomila

He has over 23,000 hours in his logbook, of which 130 were flown in the last fifteen months. Not that incredible for an aviation professional, you may think, but with a curent PPL and class two medical at 96, Laureano Ruiz Liaño is probably the world's oldest active pilot.

Laureano was born on 15 June 1924 in Santander (northern Spain). A wonderful chap full of knowledge and information, he got the aviation bug while growing up in northern Spain. Back then a famous pioneer pilot called Pombo was flying in the area, and the aeroplanes started drawing the attention of the little boy. So, he got into aviation as soon as he could−keep in mind that Spain is not a particularly aviation-oriented country, and it wasn’t easy to fly just after the Civil War.

But on 16 September 1943, the nineteen-year-old boy won his gliding ‘A’ certificate at the flight school of Colomba de Somoza, in the Spanish region of Leon. After that he started flying at the wonderful glider site of Monflorite in Huesca, just by the foot of the western Pyrenees. It was there that the young Laureano got his additional glider licences: a class B certificate, then a class C on 19 July 1944 and, three days later, his Silver C with a flight of over five hours. All of that in less than a year! Then, in June 1946 he received his first-class glider navigation permit and in the following two weeks he flew 32 hours, several flights lasting between five and eight hours.

From then on he started to play an increasing role in the growth of Spanish general aviation. In 1948 he co-founded the Santander Aero Club and, with the help of three French friends, brought to Spain the plans to build an Autoplan, which he eventually completed in 1952− the aircraft being a Pou du Ciel (Flying Flea) lookalike.