Watch Ettore Bugatti’s Only Airplane Make Its First Flight

A beautiful flight with an imperfect end
The "Blue Dream"
Bugatti 100p Project

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In June 1940, as the Nazis advanced across Europe, legendary Parisian automobile maker Ettore Buggati hid the body of a unique airplane at his estate outside the city. Untouched by the war, Bugatti’s forward-swept-wing single-seat racer never flew, a strange and beautiful aircraft design all but abandoned by history. In 2013, a Kickstarter project to make a working reproduction raised over $60,000 to make an actual flying version, and today the project released the good news: it flew!

Here’s another angle, from a camera on the wing:

Unfortunately, one of the brake pedals wasn’t working, so the plane had to make a crash landing.

The pilot is okay. A statement posted to the Bugatti 100P project facebook page yesterday by the pilot reads:

Despite the setback, there is still elation in the aircraft. Watch the video of the flight below, and listen for the screams of joy at about the one-minute mark: