A man built a plane and took his family on an ultimate European vacation

How’s this for DIY: A london-based man decided to build his own plane during lockdown to travel across Europe with his family.

Build-it-yourself plane

While some of us spent COVID-19 lockdown just laying on the couch and watching Netflix, an Indian man, living in the UK, took it as an opportunity to build an aircraft in order to travel to different countries with his family.

Ashok Thamarakshan, an Indian-born mechanical engineer, said that it was in the time of lockdown when he got the idea of making an aircraft.

“I built a temporary workshop in my house in London. I started the work on the aircraft in May 2019, and completed it on November 21, 2021.” said Thamarakshan

According to IOL, Thamarakshan thought of building the aircraft on his own due to the traffic block. Now, with the aircraft, he can travel 250km in an hour without any traffic to slow him down.

The engineer said that he had always wanted to take his family on trips in an aircraft, but that hiring one was too expensive an option. Thamarakshan, who earned a pilot’s licence from a British civil aviation company, took his family across four European countries, including Germany, France and Italy.

ALSO READ: Return to the air: A380 planes making a worldwide comeback

The plane, with its’ four seats, cost around €140 000 euros (+- R2.3m) to make, and is named “G Diya”, after his youngest daughter, Diya.

Watch more about Thamarakshan and his plane below: