AVweb introduced readers to Chip Yates in April, and his quest to retrace the steps of Charles Lindbergh, flying more than 3,500-miles across the Atlantic -- but in an electric aircraft -- is making progress, but is hampered by funding. The engineer's project currently exists as plans calculations and projections. Among them, Yates proposes to build an electrically-powered twin motor aircraft that otherwise has the physical appearance of a sailplane in canard configuration. Yates calculates his 100-foot wingspan airplane will have a sailplane-respectable lift to drag ratio of 35:1 and the ability to carry 26,000 pounds of its own airframe and batteries. As we told you in April, his design is not solar powered and he would undertake the 3,500-plus mile oversea route with the clear understanding that his battery pack only has capacity for 700 miles. Yates' solution to that mathematically impossible range dilemma is that he would not be flying "alone." If successful, this project would not be Yates' first "first."
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://www.avweb.com/news/chip-yates-presses-on-in-quest-to-cross-atlantic-on-electric