Circumnavigation world record progression
This is a list of the fastest circumnavigation, made by a person or team, excluding orbits of Earth from spacecraft.
List
People or team | Total duration (days) | Departure date | Arrival date | Notes | Reference |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Juan Sebastián Elcano and crew (originally led by Ferdinand Magellan) | 1082 | 20 September 1519 | 6 September 1522 | [1] | |
Francis Drake and crew | 1018 | 13 December 1577 | 26 September 1580 | [1] | |
Thomas Cavendish and crew | 781 | 21 July 1586 | 9 September 1588 | [1] | |
Crew of the Eendracht (originally led by Willem Schouten and Jacob Le Maire) | 748 | 14 June 1615 | 1 July 1617 | [2] | |
John Byron and crew | 676 | 2 July 1764 | 9 May 1766 | [3] | |
George Simpson | 605 | March 1841 | October 1842 | [4] | |
Clipper Marco Polo, Captain James "Bully" Forbes. | 175 | 4 July 1852 | 26 December 1852 | From Liverpool | [5][6] |
Clipper Lightning, Captain James "Bully" Forbes. | 162 | 14 May 1854 | 23 October 1854 | From Liverpool to Liverpool. | [7] |
James Iredell Waddell and crew | 394 | 8 October 1864 | 6 November 1865 | CSS Shenandoah from London to Liverpool | [8] |
This period is incomplete | |||||
George Francis Train | "80 days" (excluding a month in France) | 1870 | 1870 | By ships and trains, from New York City, perhaps inspiring Jules Verne | [9] |
Nellie Bly | 72 | 14 November 1889 | 25 January 1890 | Multiple means of transport, inspired by Jules Verne | [10] |
George Francis Train | 67 days, 12 hours, 3 minutes | 18 March 1890 | 24 May 1890 | By ships and trains, from Tacoma, Washington | [9][11] |
George Francis Train | 64 days | 9 May 1891 | 12 July 1891 | By ships and trains, from Fairhaven, Washington | [9] |
J. Willis Sayre | 54 days 9 hours and 42 minutes | 1903 | 1903 | From Seattle, via Trans-Siberian Railway. | [12] |
Andre Jaeger-Schmidt, Henry Frederick, John Henry Mears | 36 | 2 July 1913 | 6 August 1913 | A combination of steamers, yachts, and trains | [13] |
Linton Wells, Edward S. Evans | 28 days 14 hours 36 minutes and 5 seconds | 1926 | 1926 | A combination of boat, airplane, and trains | [14][15] |
John Henry Mears | 23 days 15 hours 21 minutes and 3 seconds | 1928 | 1928 | [16] | |
Hugo Eckener | 21 days, 5 hours and 31 minutes | 8 August 1929 | 29 August 1929 | First circumnavigation in an airship, aboard LZ 127 Graf Zeppelin from Lakehurst, New Jersey | [17][18] |
Pilot Wiley Post and navigator Harold Gatty | 8 days, 15 hours and 51 minutes | 23 June 1931 | 1 July 1931 | Lockheed Vega aeroplane, travelled 24,903 kilometres (15,474 mi), did not cross equator | [19] |
Wiley Post | 7 days, 19 hours, 49 minutes | 15 July 1933 | 22 July 1933 | Using an autopilot and radio direction finder, did not cross equator. From New York City | [19][20] |
Howard Hughes, navigator Thomas Thurlow, engineer Richard Stoddard, and mechanic Ed Lund | 3 days, 19 hours, 17 minutes[21] | 10 July 1938 | 14 July 1938 | Lockheed 14 Super Electra (NX18973) New York City; flight operations manager Albert Lodwick[22] | |
James Gallagher and crew (United States Air Force) | 94 hours and 1 minute | 1949 | 1949 | B-50 Superfortress Lucky Lady II first aircraft to circle globe non-stop with four in-air refuelings, 37,743 kilometres (23,452 mi), did not cross equator and traveled no further south than the 20-degree parallel. | [23] |
Col. James Morris[24] and crew (United States Air Force) | 45 hours and 19 minutes | January 16, 1957 | January 18, 1957 | Operation Power Flite, three B-52 bombers, led by Lucky Lady III, supported by at least 76 KC-76 refueling aircraft, 39,147 kilometres (24,325 mi), no equatorial crossing | [25][26] |
David Springbett | 44 hours and 6 minutes | 8 January 1980 | 10 January 1980 | Retains record for circumnavigation using only scheduled transportation. | [26] |
Air France | 32 hours 49 minutes and 3 seconds | 12 October 1992 | 13 October 1992 | Concorde FAI "Westbound Around the World" world air speed record from Lisbon, Portugal. | [27][28][29] |
Michel Dupont and Claude Hetru (Air France) | 31 hours 27 minutes and 49 seconds | 15 August 1995 | 16 August 1995 | Concorde with 98 passengers and crew, no equatorial crossing. "Eastbound Around the World" world air speed record from John F. Kennedy International Airport, New York. | [30][31] |
Other categories
People or team | Total duration (days) | Departure date | Arrival date | Notes | Reference |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Steve Fossett | 13 days, 8 hours, 33 minutes | 19 June 2002 | 3 July 2002 | Spirit of Freedom balloon, first solo aircraft to fly around the world without stopping or refueling from Northam, Western Australia | [32] |
Steve Fossett | 67 hours, 1 minute, 10 seconds | 28 February 2005 | 3 March 2005 | GlobalFlyer first solo nonstop un-refueled fixed-wing aircraft flight around the world from Salina, Kansas | [33][34][35] |
Bertrand Piccard and André Borschberg | 5 months | 9 March 2015 | Five months later | Solar Impulse the first round-the-world solar flight in history. | [36] |
United States Army Air Service, Lowell H. Smith and Leslie P. Arnold, and Erik H. Nelson and John Harding Jr. | 175 calendar days, and covered 26,345 miles (42,398 km) | 17 March 1924 | 28 September 1924 | First aerial circumnavigation 363 flying hours 7 minutes; two aircraft of four Douglas World Cruisers complete the mission from Sand Point, Seattle, Washington. | [37]: 315 [38] |
Charles Kingsford Smith, Charles Ulm, and crew | over 2 years | 31 May 1928 | June 1930 | Southern Cross from Oakland, California | [39][40] |
Captain Ford and Crew | one month | 2 December 1941 | 6 January 1942 | Pan American World Airways' Pacific Clipper the Boeing 314 Clipper flying boat NC-18609(A) the first commercial plane flight to circumnavigate the world from Treasure Island, San Francisco to LaGuardia Field.[41] | |
Rutan Voyager, Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager | 9 days, 3 minutes and 44 seconds | 14 December 1986 | 23 December 1986 | first aircraft to fly around the world without stopping or refueling from Edwards Air Force Base | [42] |
Bertrand Piccard and Brian Jones | 19 days, 21 hours, and 55 minutes | 1 March 1999 | 21 March 1999 | Breitling Orbiter 3 first balloon to fly around the world non-stop from Swiss Alpine village of Château-d'Oex | [43] |
See also
References
- ^ a b c Townsend, George Henry; Martin, Frederick W. (1862). The Manual of Dates: a Dictionary of Reference to All the Most Important Events in the History of Mankind to be Found in Authentic Records. p. 217. Retrieved 5 May 2015.
- ^ An Historical Account of the Circumnavigation of the Globe: And of the Progress of Discovery in the Pacific Ocean, from the Voyage of Magellan to the Death of Cook. Harper & brothers. 1837. pp. 100.
- ^ Australian Joint Copying Project Handbook: Miscellaneous (M series). National Library Australia. 1998. p. 29. ISBN 9780642106964. Retrieved 5 May 2015.
- ^ Simpson, Sir George (1847). An overland journey round the world: during the years 1841 and 1842. Lea and Blanchard.
- ^ https://www.thecornpoppy.com/2020/02/marco-polo-and-bully-forbes.html
- ^ Wilson, Derek (2003). A Brief History of the Circumnavigators. Constable & Co. ISBN 9781472113290.
- ^ Wilson, Derek (2003). A Brief History of the Circumnavigators. Constable & Co. ISBN 9781472113290.
- ^ Baldwin, John (2007). Last Flag Down: The Epic Journey of the Last Confederate Warship. Crown Publishers. ISBN 978-5-557-76085-0.
- ^ a b c "William Lightfoot Visscher, Journal profile, part one". Skagitriverjournal.com. Retrieved 2013-07-20.
- ^ Ruddick, Nicholas. “Nellie Bly, Jules Verne, and the World on the Threshold of the American Age.” Canadian Review of American Studies, Volume 29, Number 1, 1999, p. 8
- ^ George Francis Train Sets the Record as the Fastest Person to Travel Round-The-World
- ^ "Sayre, James Willis (1877-1963)".
- ^ The New York Times, "A Run Around the World", August 8, 1913
- ^ Corporation, Bonnier (October 1926). Popular Science. Bonnier Corporation.
- ^ Wells, Linton (1926). Around the World in Twenty-eight Days. Houghton Mifflin.
- ^ Glines, Carroll V. Round-the-world flights, Ch. 2 (3rd ed. 2003) (ISBN 978-1574884487)
- ^ Geisenheyer, Max. "Mit 'Graf Zeppelin' Um Die Welt: Ein Bild-Buch". Frankfurter Societäts-Druckerei G.m.b.H., Frankfurt am Mein (Germany), 1929.
- ^ "Around the World with the Graf Zeppelin". Modern Mechanics. November 1929. pp. 64–65.
- ^ a b "Wiley H. Post". First Flight Society. Retrieved: June 23, 2020.
- ^ Meunier, Claude. "WILEY POST" Archived 2016-03-04 at the Wayback Machine. Solo flights around the world. October 15, 2007. Retrieved: December 6, 2012.
- ^ "A Rich Young Texan with a Poet's Face Gets Hero's Welcome on World Flight." Life , July 25, 1938, pp. 9–11, 14. Retrieved: October 14, 2012.
- ^ "Around the World in 91 Hours". Historical Marker Project website. Retrieved July 27, 2016.
- ^ Waggoner, Walter H. (March 3, 1949). "First in History; High Officials Greet the Plane as It Ends Hop at Fort Worth". nytimes. Retrieved 23 August 2014.
- ^ Morris had co-piloted the Gallagher flight in '49
- ^ Airlift Tanker: History of U.S. Airlift and Tanker Forces. Turner Publishing Company. 1995. ISBN 9781563111259.
- ^ a b Bonner, Sara "The fastest man in the atmosphere" in The Times, 12 January 1980, p.3.
- ^ Cramoisi, George (2010). Air Crash Investigations: The End of the Concorde Era, the Crash of Air France Flight 4590. Lulu. p. 518. ISBN 978-0-557-84950-5.
- ^ "French Concorde to attempt round-the-world record". Anchorage Daily News. 12 October 1992.
- ^ "Aerial Circumnavigation: Records". The Postal History of ICAO. Retrieved 20 July 2024.
- ^ "Fastest circumnavigation by passenger aircraft". Guinness World Records. 16 August 1995. Retrieved 12 May 2019.
- ^ "Aerial Circumnavigation: Records". The Postal History of ICAO. Retrieved 20 July 2024.
- ^ "National Aviation Hall of Fame". Archived from the original on 2020-12-07. Retrieved 2020-08-15.
- ^ Fossett sets record for longest nonstop flight February 11, 2006
- ^ "Fossett sets solo flight record" Archived November 6, 2005, at the Wayback Machine – BBC News article dated March 3, 2005
- ^ "Fossett makes history" Archived March 5, 2005, at the Wayback Machine – CNN.com article dated March 4, 2005
- ^ First Round-The-World Solar Flight (SolarImpulse.com) Archived 20 January 2015 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Thomas, Lowell (1925). The First World Flight. Boston & New York: Houghton Mifflin Company.
- ^ "First round-the-world flight." National Museum of the United States Air Force, 8 July 2009. Retrieved: 14 July 2017.
- ^ "7.30 report story about Charles Ulm". ABCnet.au. 31 May 1928. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 21 September 2009.
- ^ Gallagher, Desmond (1986). Shooting Suns and Things: Transatlantic Fliers at Portmarnock. Kingford Press. ISBN 0951156519.
- ^ Bull, John (August 2014). "The Long Way Round: The Plane that Accidentally Circumnavigated the World". Lapsed Historian. Medium.com. Retrieved April 22, 2018.
- ^ "Official FAI database". Archived from the original on 2013-12-24. Retrieved 2012-12-23.
- ^ Associated Press, "'Grandiose' Trip Ends: Balloonists tough down in Egyptian desert", March 22, 1999,