AMELIA: Three weeks ago, teen pilot Oliver O'Halloran was getting ready
to take-off on an epic journey to become the youngest person ever
to fly around Australia solo and unassisted.
Yeah, I'm pretty excited.
Yeah, quite excited, the trip's gonna be a pretty good trip.
It's quite the dream for a schoolkid who's only just turned 17,
only just got their full pilot's licence
and can't actually drive a car yet.
It's quite interesting, when it comes to the driver's licence,
I haven't got my Ps yet, just got my Ls.
But, yeah, a lot of people are surprised
when I tell them about it.
Ollie's plan was to set off from Hobart
and fly nearly 15.000 kays over 20 days,
following the whole coastline,
with stops along the way to rest, re-fuel and visit schools.
I'll speak to them about achieving their dreams,
so it's the main idea behind the flight,
I think the record's just a bonus.
Ollie was inspired after meeting his own teenage hero, Ryan Campbell,
who was once the youngest person ever to fly around the world solo.
This trip has been three years in the making
and before Ollie set off there were lots of cuddles
from the fam and well-wishers.
I hope you don't crash!
By the end of May, Ollie had travelled just over two weeks
with a few hiccups along the way like some bad weather
over the Gold Coast and Perth.
But when he made this stop, he was in high spirits!
Get it? Anyway...
Hiya. Hello.
It's been really good. It's been very busy.
I've been trying to average around six hours.
The longest day we had was from Darwin down to Port Hedland
which was nine hours of flying, so that was quite a busy day.
Most of the time, I'm keeping myself on track,
so I've got a map in front of me as I showed before,
so I tend to use the map or listen to music
or just stuff like that
and just sort of relax and enjoy the flight, yeah.
G'day, mate. George. Nice to meet you.
Ryan.
Ollie was also greeted by some fellow aviation enthusiasts
who got a chance to learn more about flying.
That's one chart and I've got 49 of those to get around Australia.
So that was mine today. Wow, 49!
He's only 17 and he's already flying by himself around Australia,
so, yeah, it's pretty cool!
I learnt many things like the gears of the plane and the GPS
and how tricky it was to fly in weather conditions.
It's amazing how he's done this at a very young age by himself
with no-one else, so I find that really inspiring, yeah.
Watch your head.
(SPEAKS INAUDIBLY)
It's cosy in here. Yeah, it is.
VOICEOVER: I even got to ask a few
very important aviation questions of my own.
So what about when you just want something to eat or, dare I ask,
you want to go to the toilet when you're flying for nine hours,
what do you do?
So there's a sneaky snack bag back there,
but I haven't actually touched it yet!
But when it comes to the toilet,
you just have to prepare pretty well, yeah.
Yeah. You have to go before you go.
If it comes to the worst, there's always a water bottle somewhere.
I won't ask where. No!
On the weekend, Ollie landed safely home in Hobart
with a warm welcome and a world record!
Obviously, the whole flight gives you a real buzz,
but to see that much support and to see all the people
who have supported me from the start has been pretty amazing.
And despite all the schoolwork he'll have to catch up on,
it's unlikely this high-flyer's gonna stay grounded for long!