A lightweight solar-powered plane has smashed the official world record for the longest-duration unmanned flight. UK defence firm Qinetiq, which built the Zephyr unmanned aerial vehicle, said it flew for 54 hours during tests. The researchers believe it is the first time a solar-powered craft has flown under its own power through two nights. The previous unmanned endurance record was set in 2001 by a jet-powered US Air Force Global Hawk surveillance aircraft which flew for more than 30 hours. The record attempt was announced very late FAI spokesperson The Zephyr’s 54-hour endurance flight will not enter the record books because representatives from the world air sports federation – the FAI – were not notified about the secretive test. However, they were informed about a second, 33-hour flight which could still become an official record. Zephyr’s development team say that whatever the result, it believes it has built a record breaker. ‘This aeroplane is going to go a lot higher and a lot further,’ Chris Kelleher, Zephyr’s technical director and ‘pilot’, told the BBC News website. ‘You ain’t seen nothing yet.’ Night flight Zephyr was originally developed to take pictures […]