Phoenix (STN) – Jessica Cox has spent her life proving what is possible. Now she is building a way for everyone to see it.
The world’s first licensed armless pilot returned to the ‘It Happens at STN’ stage in November to preview the Impossible Airplane, a four-seat RB-10 that will be the first aircraft in aviation history that can be flown with feet alone.
The plane started as “literally just parts and pieces that came to us,” Cox said. It took five years and 2,000 hours of volunteer labor to put it together.
For Cox, the aircraft is about more than aviation. “Oftentimes people think someone has a disability and immediately give them the label of ‘you can’t do it,’” she said. “We really want to change that up to say that any child with a disability can achieve anything. This airplane is going to be the visual proof that anything is possible. And if I can fly it with my feet, then what’s holding back any child with a disability?”
That belief has shaped her message for years. “When we say ‘I can’t,’ we set ourselves up for failure,” Cox said. She described resilience as “overcoming that discomfort to grow to be something better and to become the best version of yourself.”
It is not always easy. “Some days are harder, and being human, that’s what it’s about,” Cox said. “You keep getting up every day, and you do the best you possibly can.” For her, faith brings perspective, and she credits the family and “whole village” that supported her as a child. “Now I want to do the same for others, knowing that they have the same potential.”
Her call to leaders was simple: give people the benefit of the doubt, whether it is a stranger at the grocery store or a coworker. “Trust that they are capable, trust that they can figure out a way to do it,” she said. One in five people will have a disability at some point, she noted. “It’s the only minority you can join at any moment in time.”
The big reveal and fundraiser is Saturday, November 14th, at Falcon Field in Mesa.
