The Starship Diaries – The Story of a Two-Year Adventure Around The Planet in the Last Aircraft of its Kind
LOS GATOS, CA, September 8th, 2004 – What would YOU do with a multi-million dollar plane and time on your hands?
The Starship Diaries, a new aviation adventure and travel novel by author Dallas Kachan, chronicles a round the world flight in a futuristic, but endangered, Beechcraft Starship aircraft. The book tells the story of a Silicon Valley dot com-era pilot who found himself at the helm of a remarkable plane with the time and means to fly it solo around the planet on the adventure of a lifetime. It features thrilling travel stories, close calls in the air and on land, and an itinerary shaped by real-world events—including the attacks of September 11th, 2001 and their effect on aviation and the world’s subsequent perception of America.
The book details exploits such as:
- Running out of fuel at night over the South Pacific
- Months of illness on a desolate tropical island
- Bar-hopping with Shanghai gangsters
- Arranging repairs in the snowy heart of Russia
- Being shot at over Africa, and more
An aeronautical and travel adventure
The Starship Diaries is both an aviation and travel adventure. While appealing to pilots and aviation enthusiasts with a wealth of technical detail in 150+ footnotes, it’s also proving fascinating to readers interested in travel literature—a compelling travel adventure even for those without an aviation background. Celebrating the art and science of flight, it also features extensive and accessibly-written geographic, political and social detail, stories of exploration and revelation, and conversations with people in exotic locations all around the world.
The book also stands as a memorial of sorts to the Beechcraft Starship aircraft at the center of the story. The Starship fleet is being retired, and this futuristic aircraft’s demise makes the book particularly compelling to those who either worked on or followed this remarkable plane.
“It would be hard to live a better dream than to be able to fly solo around the world in a Starship without a schedule,” said legendary aviation pioneer Burt Rutan, president of Scaled Composites, original designer of the Starship and designer of X PRIZE contender SpaceShipOne. “Like many others who will read The Starship Diaries, it made me want to drop everything, find a Starship and go tomorrow!”
The 400+ page book is published by 11010011. It sells for $24 U.S. dollars and can be purchased here. Orders are shipped worldwide for a nominal fee.
About the Starship
The Beechcraft Starship was a radical new design in corporate aviation. Unfortunately, it was not a commercial success. Over the last year, Raytheon has been quietly buying back its Starships, offering owners attractive terms and trade-up programs to the company’s newer, modern jet aircraft. The Starship was finally, inevitably, doomed by economics. There just weren’t enough of the plane made for Raytheon to be able to justify keeping the line alive. Several have been donated to museums, but most are being dismantled or are being stored. Starship photos, news articles and memorabilia are available at www.starshipdiaries.com.
About the author
Dallas Kachan previously ran a technology marketing strategy consulting practice in San Francisco, California and has served as vice president of sales and marketing for high tech startups. Prior to his technology career, Kachan had been a reporter, editor and newscaster for the Canadian Press in Toronto, Canada. Kachan has a B.A.A. from Ryerson University in Toronto, Canada and lives in the mountains of Silicon Valley near Santa Cruz, California. He’s been flying since 1994.
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Beechcraft and Starship are registered trade names of Raytheon Aircraft Company and are used by permission. The Starship Diaries is a trademark of 11010011.