Growing up in the ’90s, and largely inspired by Back to the Future II, I wanted nothing more than to own a real-life hoverboard. The way Marty McFly face-pushed that little girl and stole her hoverboard to escape the evil Biff Tannen was something every kid dreamed of. That bully Biff Tannen was such a dick. Canada’s Catalin Alexandru Duru, who is surely a Back to the Future II himself, built his own hoverboard prototype and hovered over a lake in Quebec for 905 feet, shattering the previous record of 164 feet—and the result is awesome!
Here’s what Catalin Alexandru Duru had to say about it:
The first real-life hoverboard. The machine was built and designed by me, Catalin Alexandru Duru. I am the first man to create and fly a working prototype.
I will showcase that stable flight can be achieved with a machine one can stand on and control with their feet, just like in the movie “Back to the Future Part II”. In our case, the machine is propeller-based.
The prototype can be used anywhere, but is usually tested over water because of how dangerously high it can fly (which is ironic considering that the movie joked that it can’t).