In Integrity: A Life Full of Passion, international test pilot Damian Hischier takes readers from the Swiss Alps to the frontiers of experimental aviation, revealing what courage, responsibility, and integrity look like when they are truly tested.
SWITZERLAND — Long before Damian Hischier became an
internationally recognized test pilot, worked on pioneering aircraft, or
entered aviation history with emerging eVTOL technology, he was a boy in a
small Swiss mountain village who constantly asked one question: Why?
That instinct to question, understand, and refuse to accept
something simply because others said so, would shape an extraordinary life.
In Integrity: A Life Full of Passion, Hischier
looks beyond the achievements to tell the human story behind them. His memoir
moves through an unconventional childhood, near-fatal accidents, physical
recovery, personal losses, relationships, professional setbacks, and a
remarkable aviation career while returning repeatedly to one principle:
integrity matters most when maintaining it comes at a cost.
Damian Hischier graduated from the National Test Pilot
School in Mojave, California, and built an international career as a freelance
test pilot. His work has included SolarStratos, the solar-powered aircraft
project created with the ambition of reaching the stratosphere, and
Volocopter’s electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft. In 2018, he
conducted the first crewed flight of the Volocopter 2X and was subsequently
recognized by the Society of Experimental Test Pilots as the world’s first
eVTOL test pilot.
But some of the defining moments of Damian’s career happened
away from public celebration.
After flight-test data showed that an aircraft did not meet
minimum certification requirements, Damian was offered €40,000 to revise his
report. He refused. During the SolarStratos project, he also resisted pressure
to conduct a public flight below legal weather minimums and later walked away
when the project’s direction conflicted with what the data showed.
These experiences give Integrity: A Life Full of
Passion its foundation. Rather than offering another formula for
positive thinking, Damian Hischier uses the choices, failures, accidents,
discoveries, and turning points of his own life to encourage readers to examine
theirs.
At its heart, the book is about taking responsibility
instead of remaining a passive recipient of circumstances. It asks readers to
make conscious decisions, remain curious, learn from difficult experiences, and
build a life aligned with their own values.
For professionals, entrepreneurs, aviation enthusiasts,
leaders, and anyone facing a crossroads, Integrity: A Life Full of
Passion offers an unconventional life story with a simple challenge at
its center: when doing the right thing carries a real price, will you still do
it?
About the Author
Damian Hischier is a Swiss professional test pilot with
approximately [DH1] two
decades of flight-test experience. A graduate of the National Test Pilot School
and a member of the Society of Experimental Test Pilots, his career spans
conventional, experimental, and emerging aviation technologies, including
SolarStratos and Volocopter. He flew more than 200 aircraft types, ranging from
gliders to high-performance jets and helicopters, and performed 17 first
flights of prototypes.
Through Integrity: A Life Full of
Passion, he shares the experiences and lessons that shaped his
philosophy of integrity, passion, courage, resilience, and personal
responsibility.
[DH1]…
four decades of flight experience and ...