23 July 2024
Ronnie Faux, adventurer, newspaper journalist and former FLYER microlight correspondent, has died at the age of 88.
As well as flying microlights of all types, particularly flex-wing, Ronnie loved all adventures and in 1981 persuaded the Editor of The Times newspaper, Harold Evans, to create a special post for him: Extreme Leisure Correspondent.
Ronnie went on to cover not only his favourite sport of mountaineering but 14 subject areas including sailing, pot-holing, deep sea diving and, of course, flying.
Ronnie trained in the traditional newspaper journalist way, starting as a junior reporter on the Keighley News. National service in the Royal Navy interrupted but he then joined The Yorkshire Evening Post, via the Bradford local paper. Later he moved to London as the Post’s correspondent, and then onto The Times.
Ronnie Faux wrote Microlight Notebook for FLYER from the mid-1990s to early 2000s
Ronnie was involved in three ascents of Mount Everest though never to the summit, including spending two weeks training in the Lake District with a British Army team. Two of the team, both SAS, were selected to go to the summit while the rest camped at 20,000ft.
Ronnie said later, “I’d done a lot of climbing … simply enjoying the mountains. It was as high as I wanted to go and I had no ambition to go any higher.”
The full story of the climb, with its dramatic ending, is told in a book written by Ronnie, Soldiers on Everest.
Ronnie was married to Frances – their courtship included a trip to the Alps on a motorbike and climbing the Matterhorn, according to The Times. She survives him along with their daughters Sarah, an ultrasonographer, and Catherine, who runs a soft furnishing business.
In 2019 Ronnie took part in a podcast with the South China Morning Post‘s Adventure Trail. It’s still available here:
