On the 100th Anniversary of the Wright Brothers' Flight, a Model Airplane Crossed the Atlantic Ocean

On the 100th anniversary of the Wright brothers' flight, a five-kilogram model airplane, built by a 77-year-old man who is deaf and nearly blind, successfully crossed the Atlantic Ocean for the first time after 38 hours and 23 minutes of flight, landing safely in Ireland. The airplane, named 'Spirit of the Farm,' took off from a few kilometers away from the location where Amelia Earhart departed in 1932 as the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic. The small aircraft carried no passengers or cargo, only the dream of a 77-year-old man. Minyard Hill, a retired engineer, spent twenty years dreaming of building a model airplane that could endure nearly 3,500 kilometers of ocean and land safely. Over the past three years, Mr. Hill worked 15 hours a day in his workshop to construct this airplane. After four previous failures and the loss of four airplanes, he succeeded on his fifth attempt. He spent $10,000 of his own money and raised $30,000 from others. Hill managed to gather support from several individuals. Barrett Foster, a 48-year-old systems engineer at the National Geographic Society, wrote a computer program for Hill's small airplane that prevented the internal autopilot from deviating more than 200 meters from the designated flight path. Les Hamilton, a 68-year-old computer consultant who, like Mr. Hill, lives in Silver Spring, Maryland, helped raise the necessary $30,000. When you look at the five-kilogram airplane, it appears simple: it has a transparent red Mylar covering, a balsa wood body, and fiberglass fibers. However, its interior is filled with wires, electronics, and delicate, complex devices. Hill and his friends also tracked the flight path of the 'Spirit of the Farm' using GPS or satellite navigation. This system, initially used by dozens of U.S. military satellites, is now available at a low cost to ordinary citizens, and many cars are equipped with it.