Great Scott! Back to the Future-style hoverboard breaks world record

A hoverboard rider recently soared into Guinness World Records after flying a record distance on the futuristic, flying skateboard. Catalin Alexandru Duru, the inventor of the prototype hoverboard, traveled the length of two-and-a-half football fields (about 905 feet or 375 meters) to achieve the world record title before landing gently in the sparkling water of Quebec’s Lake Ouareau. Duru reached a height of 16.4 feet (5 m), but the flying board is allegedly capable of much greater altitudes, said Duru, who told Guinness World Records that his machine could reach “scary heights.”

I wanted to showcase that a stable flight can be achieved on a hoverboard and a human could stand and control with their feet.

Catalin Alexandru Duru

The hoverboard was inspired by the movie Back to the Future Part II. In the 1989 classic, Marty McFly, played by Michael J. Fox, flees from a band of bullies on a stolen hoverboard. McFly’s escape plan is almost thwarted when he unsuccessfully tries to hover over a small pond. The fictional device only works over land, so it may have lifted off the ground by electromagnets repelled by magnetic forces from the Earth itself. Duru’s real-life flying skateboard is a bit simpler than McFly’s: It has a propeller that helps lift it into the air. But just like McFly, Duru controlled the hoverboard using only his feet. Last year, a California-based company ran a successful Kickstarter campaign to support the development of a more McFly-esque version of the hoverboard, called the Hendo Hoverboard, that uses electromagnets.

Technology hoverboard