By Pamela Sampson
Associated Press
02 May 2002
LE BOURGET, France (AP) -- Erik Lindbergh arrived in France on Thursday after flying across the Atlantic Ocean to duplicate his grandfather's historic 1927 New York-to-Paris solo flight.
Lindbergh's Lancair Columbia 300 -- dubbed the New Spirit of St. Louis -- landed at Le Bourget airport outside Paris shortly before 5:30 a.m. EDT (0930 GMT). The flight lasted about 17 hours.
The re-creation was part of celebrations for the 75th anniversary of Charles Lindbergh's famous May 20-21, 1927 voyage. That flight, the first nonstop solo run from New York to Paris, took 33 1/2 hours.
Erik Lindbergh had taken off from Republic Airport in Farmingdale, New York at 12:15 p.m. EDT (1615 GMT) on Wednesday.
Lindbergh already has duplicated the first two legs of his grandfather's journey: from San Diego to St. Louis, and St. Louis to Farmingdale.
His $289,000 aircraft, made of a glass and carbon composite, has an average cruise speed of 184 mph (296 kph), compared with the 108 mph (174 kph) of the original Spirit of St. Louis, built for $10,580.
The single-engine plane uses a Global Positioning System navigation device to chart its exact location. In comparison, Charles Lindbergh used dead reckoning -- basically, "holding a compass and guessing at the wind," as his grandson has described it.
The voyage was designed to raise awareness of rheumatoid arthritis, which disabled 37-year-old Lindbergh for 15 years before drug treatment helped restore his movement.
Organizers also hope the journey will promote the X Prize Foundation, a St. Louis-based nonprofit group that is offering $10 million to the first private group that can build and launch a manned spacecraft into space, then repeat the feat within two weeks.