July 7 (UPI) — A group of students from Italy’s University of Pisa constructed a paper plane with a wingspan of 65.75 feet and flew it a distance of 193.5 feet to break a Guinness World Record.
The students, who dubbed their group Project Icarus, hand-constructed the airplane exclusively from paper and glue with help from engineering education influencer Jakidale.
The finished plane had a wingspan of 65.75 feet and measured 23 feet long.
The students successfully launched the plane for a 193.5-foot flight at the We Make Future fair at the BolognaFiere event venue in Bologna, earning the Guinness World Record for the world’s largest paper aircraft.
The previous record was set by Germany’s Braunschweig Institute of Technology in 2013.
“It all started with a few paper airplanes between classes, almost as a joke. We were students convinced that, with the right method, even a piece of paper could become real engineering,” the Project Icarus students explained in a news release. “Months of study, simulations, mistakes, and restarts followed. In the end, we managed to bring back to Italy a world record that had stood for thirteen years.”
