Born in Viana do Alentejo in 1942, he was a pilot in the Portuguese Air Force, where he took the militia pilot-aviator course.
Back in civil life, he worked at the General Directorate of Civil Aeronautics and joined DETA (Mozambique Airlines), where he began his career as a co-pilot. He later qualified as a co-pilot for Boeing 737 in the USA.
After a delicate surgical intervention, he became disabled. Despite this disability, he did not lose interest in aviation and back in Portugal, he chose to travel to the United States of America, where he took a specific course for paraplegic pilots, a qualification that was recognized by the organization that at that time was called General Directorate of Portuguese Civil Aviation.
Among the many trips he made we can refer to the crossing of the South Atlantic, from Lisbon to Rio de Janeiro in 1993; two trips around the world: one of them made in complete solitude, in 1995, and the one when he travelled alone on one plane and a pilot accompanied him on another plane, in 2004.
