जीवनी

Attempted to become the first woman to fly a single-engine plane solo from New York to Moscow, but was deterred in Denmark when the Soviet government denied her permission to enter their air space.

Experienced an event that belied her later aviation accomplishments. She was a passenger aboard the Clipper Washington, a Boeing 707 on a transatlantic flight from Paris to New York City when it dropped from 35,000 feet to 6000 feet. It happened on 2/3/59, the same day Buddy Holly died in an airplane crash. These events gave her a paralyzing fear of flying and it took extensive hypnosis to overcome it. In July 1964 she was reintroduced to personal flying during an evening flight over Los Angeles in a Cessna 172. The experience motivated her to return the next day to the Santa Monica Airport to begin training for a Private Pilot certificate the next year.

Was named Pilot of the Year in 1970.

In celebration of Star Trek (1966)'s 30th anniversary, an action figure was released of Susan as her character, Vina, on The Cage (1966).

Her memoir "Odyssey" detailed her journeys as a pilot. She once survived the crash of her own Piper Cub plane in 1966.