French engineer and helicopter pilot Pascal Chretien recently flew into the history books with an aviation feat that took him only about one meter off the ground.
Despite the low altitude, his completion of the first untethered, all-electric manned helicopter flight last month is quite an achievement. Flying a prototype he designed and built largely by himself over the course of a year, Chretien made it into the air for a total of 2 minutes and 10 seconds, beating out the likes of Sikorsky and others to become the first to reach such a milestone.
