the fastest rc plane on earth has no engine

i grew up fascinated by planes. as a kid i’d get excited naming every plane as we taxied through airports on our 26+ hour journey to chennai. 747, 737, a380. i really loved planes lol

blake scholl just put up an $800,000 prize for the first amateur-built rc plane to break the sound barrier, and my first thought was tiny jet engines. then i looked into the actual rc speed record and it rearranged how i think about the whole contest

turns out the record is 564 mph, and it belongs to spencer lisenby’s transonic dp -- a glider. no engine at all. he flies it by dynamic soaring, carving loops through the wind shear behind a california ridge, picking up a little energy on every lap

apparently albatrosses surf wind shear when they cross oceans, barely flapping the whole way -- so the technique is modeled after that. it’s wild to see a hobbyist borrow a bird’s trick and get three quarters of the way to mach 1 on wind and geometry alone