14 Countries to Go : Pilot of Ultralight Has Heavy Agenda in Tour of World

Halfway through his world tour, with 14 countries and 12,000 miles still to go, Patrice Franceschi has already crashed in Brazil, battled sandstorms in the Sahara and dodged guerrillas in northern Morocco--all while flying a delicate, 250-pound contraption called an ultralight.

In September, 1984, Franceschi kissed his wife and child goodby and left Paris for what is being billed as the first around-the-world ultralight voyage, even though he is not crossing the major stretches of ocean in his craft.

Monday, Franceschi dropped in at Pacoima’s Whiteman Airport.

“Some countries stop you; they give you many problems, especially countries in war,” said Franceschi, who began his journey in his hometown of Paris. “America is easy. You have no regulations on ultralights,” he explained.

Open Cockpit

Franceschi’s ultralight has 30-foot wings of nylon and tubular aluminium with a fiberglass fuselage. Wearing goggles and an orange jump suit--”It gets very cold,” he says--Franceschi flies about four hours a day sitting in an open cockpit. A wooden propeller is mounted behind him.

From Paris, he flew through Spain, the Straits of Gibraltar, Morocco--where he was grounded for three months because guerrillas were shooting down planes--and through Western Africa to Senegal.

The voyage, which he estimates will cost $60,000, is sponsored by Adidas and UTA, a French airline. Franceschi hopes to be back in Paris within eight months.

Traveling in 250-mile hops, Franceschi averages speeds of 40 to 45 m.p.h.

Franceschi speaks five languages, including English and Arabic. “For the past six months, I spoke only Spanish,” he said, recalling his journey through South and Central America. He crossed the Amazon jungle without injury, going from village to village, landing in clearings and on dirt roads.

This week, in Los Angeles, Franceschi will pack away his plane for shipment to Singapore.

From there, he will fly through Malaysia, Thailand, Burma, Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria, Turkey, Greece, Italy and finally, back to France.

When he gets back home, Franceschi will take up his original profession--as a journalist, he said. Not one to shirk danger, he hopes to be sent to Afghanistan or Lebanon.