An unmanned airship created by a California company flew 95,085 feet into the air, higher than any airship in history, the company said.
JP Aerospace of Rancho Cordova took the twin-balloon Tandem airship to Nevada's Black Rock Desert Sunday for the launch, KTXL-TV, Sacramento, Calif., reported.
Remotely controlled by an operator on the ground, the Tandem's two balloons are separated by a 30-foot-long carbon fiber truss while two 6-foot propellers are each driven by an electric motor to maneuver the airship.
Once at the record-breaking height, the motors were turned on to fly the ship through a series of maneuvers.
However, when one of the balloons burst the Tandem was brought down to a soft landing with the help of five parachutes.
Tandem was built to be a "workhorse vehicle" to carry smaller research rockets to high altitudes at a fraction of the cost large aerospace companies are spending, company officials said,
"We've spent about $30,000 and the past five years developing Tandem," JP Aerospace President John Powell said in a release.
