anyone know about long distance flight?

I remember hearing on NPR a few years ago about a group of retired aeronatical engineers who had gotten together and built a number of model airplanes that used miniature autopilot circuits and GPS to fly incredible distances. They were trying to fly one across the Atlantic.The radio article talked about their taking off and a bit of their trials, but I could never find anything about them actually being able to pull it off. I thought someone here might know something about this... Any information is greatly appreciated.Thanks!

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  • In the RC mags, (the main stream american ones) there was from time to time discussions about endurance contests. They were all flown manually (often from the backs of cars) arond a set course. The plane that flew the farthest won. The race sedlom went to the swiftest. One poster has already mentioned the transatlantic effort of Maynard .... (gosh his name escapes me) .. who did a lot of the early work setting records. interesting reading.

    Good luck witht hat keep the foum posted.
  • Moderator
    Obviously this would be nothing all that new since the Aerosonde "Laima" flew autononously across the Atlantic almost 10 years ago. I first saw it in the Air & Space Museum in Seattle.

    Since then there was an FAI Class F / F3A model sailplane in 2003.

    And of course the Global Hawk UAV flew across the Pacific in 2001.
    (I know, its hardly a "model" as we have been discussing here at this site)
  • They did manage a transatlantic flight on (IIRC) the second attempt in August 2003. See http://tam.plannet21.com/
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