A BRAVE North Lancashire woman has embarked on a daring mission to pilot her vintage Tiger Moth plane half way around the world.

Amanda Harrison, of Nether Kellet, set off from Biggin Hill on Saturday on a 9,260 mile flight to Darwin in Australia. Her route will take her over 23 countries and will see her fly across Europe, Turkey, Jordan, Arabia, The United Arab Emirates, India, Thailand and Malaysia. It will involve 33 take-offs and landings.

She is paying tribute to her aviation hero Amy Johnson who completed the journey in a second-hand Gipsy Moth after setting off from Croydon Airport on May 5 1930.

It is Amanda's first major adventure since she was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2017. Following treatment and surgery she was given the all clear last year.

But she says that she is also taking to the skies on this incredible adventure to inspire women and to encourage cancer survivors to achieve great things in their life.

Along the way she will be meeting with women pilots across the world, flying under a squadron badge honouring the colours of Amy Johnson's plane.

Amy Johnson gained a ground engineer’s “C” licence and, with the financial help of her father, Richard, took flying lessons. In 1929 she was awarded her pilot’s licence.

On her journey she had no radio, no reliable weather information, her maps were basic and, on some stretches of the route, she flew over uncharted land.

Her flight was full of incident and she had many adventures and had to make a number of forced landings. In India she amazed an army garrison by landing on a parade ground and, when she reached Burma (modern-day Myanmar), she faced a monsoon. Outside Rangoon an unorthodox landing tore a hole in her aeroplane's wing and damaged its propeller. A local technical institute repaired the wing by unpicking shirts made from aeroplane fabric salvaged from the First World War.

Amy went on to complete many other adventures and in the second world war she joined the ATA (Air Transport Auxiliary) where during a ferry flight she ditched and died. She did however go down in the annals of aviation as one of the greatest aerial adventurers.

Amanda's mother, Jennifer, who lived in Nether Kellet for 37 years, said: "It is very exciting but also very frightening. She is in a small plane made of wood and fabric. She is having to fly manually and pump the fuel from tank to tank. It's quite physical."