Zara Rutherford, who finished her A-levels at St Swithun’s in Winchester last year, has successfully completed her circumnavigation of the globe – setting two world records in the process. 
After a challenging and dangerous journey of 22 weeks, Zara returned to Kortrijk airport close to her base in Belgium from where she embarked on her world-record breaking attempt on 18th August last year.
Travelling in a small Shark ultralight aircraft, Zara faced lengthy delays to avoid bad weather conditions. She spent a month in Alaska waiting for a safe weather window and experienced temperatures as low as -34c.
She finally touched down two months later than originally planned having accumulated 200 hours in the air and travelling 52,080km across five continents and 31 countries.  The 19-year-old has become the youngest woman to fly solo around the world and the youngest person to do so in a microlight aircraft.
St. Swithun’s School, Winchester. Credit: Swithun’s School
Zara qualified as a pilot whilst studying for her A-levels in mathematics, further mathematics, economics and physics at St Swithun?s. She first began flying when she was 14.
In breaking two world records she hopes to inspire other girls and young women to pursue their dreams and in particular to take up flying or enter STEM-related careers. Her daring exploits and positive attitude have encouraged over 50 girls at St Swithun?s to take up flying lessons as part of the school?s co-curricul...