Videos
Take a look at video stories and interviews of Cecilia about her flying and her book.
Cecilia Aragon:
Aerobatic Pilot
How One UW Professor Left Her Fears on the Ground to Become an Aerobatics Champ (12:23)
May 4, 2022
How does someone afraid of taking an elevator end up strapped upside down in a tiny plane thousands of feet above the ground? For UW Professor Cecilia Aragon, that transformation began when she said yes to a friend who took her flying — and led to her becoming the first Latina pilot on the U.S. Unlimited Aerobatic Team, “the Olympics of aviation.”
This short film explores her life-changing journey from being a novice pilot with an intense fear of heights to becoming an aerobatics champion flying complicated loops, rolls and spins. Emboldened by her success in the sky, Aragon completed her doctorate and embarked on a teaching career, eventually becoming the first Latina full professor in the UW College of Engineering.
Aragon, a faculty member in the Department of Human Centered Design & Engineering, chronicled her experiences in her 2020 memoir, “Flying Free.”
Mission Unstoppable (5:42)
February 18, 2025
First Look at Copies of My Book Flying Free (0:42)
April 5, 2020
It’s traditional for new authors to post an “unboxing video” when the first copies of their books arrive. So here’s a 40-second video of my reaction to seeing FLYING FREE for the first time. These are “ARCs” or “advance review copies,” not-for-sale copies sent to potential reviewers and the media so they’ll read and hopefully comment on the book.
I can’t believe this is finally happening! After so many years of writing and re-writing, querying, and dealing with rejections… here is my memoir in book form at last. And it’s beautiful!
Cecilia Aragon, Aerobatic Pilot (5:11)
April 13, 2010
Television news segment