Arthur Williams flies to the edge in new Channel 4 series
Some of the planet’s most extraordinary and spectacular experiences are only accessible by air. In Flying to the Edge of the World, a new 3-part series from Blast! Films for Channel 4, Arthur Williams (C4 Paralympics, D-Day: As it Happens, The Plane that Saved Britain) flies to some of the world’s smallest and most dangerous landing strips to find out why people want to live at the ends of the earth, and discover how tiny planes are opening up the planet’s most remote and most beautiful wildernesses. The series will encounter everything from grizzly bears and gold prospectors in Northern Canada, to the deadly race to harvest Himalayan Viagra in the remotest reaches of Nepal, to flying missionaries spreading the Word deep in the Papuan jungle.
Seven years ago, Royal Marine commando Arthur was paralysed in a car crash. An inveterate adrenaline junkie, he needed another outlet for his spirit of adventure and so taught himself to fly. Over the course of the last year, he’s experienced some of the most challenging flying in the world: navigating perilous mountain air currents in Nepal, boat planes in Canada, helicopter cattle herding in the Australian outback, and runways clinging to the side of sheer cliffs in Papua.
The result is a series full of jaw-dropping aerial footage of some of the Earth’s least-explored and most stunning landscapes. The series will also feature the people whose lives have been changed irreversibly by the coming of the plane, or who rely on aeroplanes for their entire existence. Arthur meets the family living on a Pacific island paradise 600km from the nearest city, the residents of the utopian experiment set up in the 1960s by First Nation Tlichco people who wanted to withdraw from integration with Canadian society, and sees how ‘Everest’s airport’ has brought Starbucks and ‘Yakdonalds’ to a once-remote Nepalese village.
Speaking about the new series, Arthur comments: “It’s been amazing working with Blast! and Channel 4 making this series. On a personal level, flying has changed my life and it’s been a privilege to visit some of the world’s most stunning and remote communities where they literally depend on planes for their everyday survival.”
John Hay, commissioning editor at Channel 4 adds: “Asking a pilot to take you travelling feels like cheating – you’re guaranteed the best views and get to go wherever you like. Arthur is the real thing, and his expertise, passion for planes and natural curiosity about the world lift this series to another level.”
Alistair Pegg, executive producer at Blast! Films, said: “From flying missionaries to Himalayan sex fungus, this series will reveal stories we haven’t heard before and take us to places we’ve never seen.”
Flying to the Edge of the World (3 x 60’) is a Blast! Films production for Channel 4.
