LE BOURGET, France — Erik Lindbergh, two generations later, replicated his grandfather's groundbreaking 1927 solo Atlantic air crossing, landing in Paris on Thursday in half the time it took the aviation pioneer to make the historic journey.
Lindbergh's Lancair Columbia 300 — dubbed the New Spirit of St. Louis — landed at Le Bourget airport outside Paris shortly before 11:30 a.m., 17 hours after taking off from Farmingdale, N.Y.
Visibly fatigued, wearing his blue pilot's jumpsuit, Lindbergh addressed his sponsors and about 100 reporters who met him at the small airport.
"It was an amazing time, 1927, and I really wanted to celebrate the 75th anniversary of Grandfather's flight," Lindbergh said.
The re-creation was part of anniversary commemorations of Charles Lindbergh's May 20-21, 1927 voyage, the first nonstop solo run from New York to Paris.
In 1927, Charles Lindbergh took five sandwiches with him on the journey but ate only a bite. His grandson brought six sandwiches along and ate one and a half.
"I did it in half the time and ate twice as much," Erik Lindbergh joked. His grandfather's flight time was 33 1/2 hours.
Lindbergh had taken off from Republic Airport in Farmingdale at 12:15 p.m. EDT Wednesday. He already has duplicated the first two legs of his grandfather's journey: from San Diego to St. Louis, and St. Louis to Farmingdale.
Lindbergh said his interest in planes didn't really stem from his grandfather.
"Becoming a pilot was almost accidental," he said. "I didn't really think about it until I was 24 and took a flight with a friend."
"It was sort of accidental," he said. "Not many members of the family fly."
The voyage was designed to raise awareness of rheumatoid arthritis, which disabled 37-year-old Lindbergh for 15 years before drug treatment helped restore his movement.
Organizers also hope the journey will promote the X Prize Foundation, a St. Louis-based nonprofit group that is offering $10 million to the first private group that can build and launch a manned spacecraft into space, then repeat the feat within two weeks.
"I'm trying to open up space flight for everyone, so that in the near future people like you and I can go and buy a ticket and fly into space," Lindbergh said.
Lindbergh's $289,000 aircraft, made of a glass and carbon composite, has an average cruise speed of 184 mph, compared with the 108 mph of the original Spirit of St. Louis, built for $10,580.
The single-engine plane uses a Global Positioning System navigation device to chart its exact location. In comparison, Charles Lindbergh used deduced reckoning — basically, "holding a compass and guessing at the wind," as his grandson has described it.