Michael Jackson (Not That One) Builds Airplane In Jersey City Townhouse
JERSEY CITY, N.J. (1010 WINS) -- Anybody can make a paper airplane at their kitchen table but imagine building a real plane inside your home. One New Jersey man did just that.
1010 WINS' Steve Sandberg speaks with Jersey City's Michael Jackson
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Michael Jackson, a 53-year-old computer programmer, built his own airplane from scratch in his tight Jersey City townhouse.
See more photos of the plane here
"The room I had to work in was about 18 to 20-feet-long. Each wing is 25-feet-long, so it was very difficult to fit it in," Jackson told 1010 WINS' Steve Sandberg.
It took him 1,800 hours -- over 14 months -- to build and put the 785-pound Senox Motorized Glider together piece by piece.
"I had never done it before but I figured I could do it, I'm pretty good at figuring things out," Jackson said. "Some people thought I was crazy but my father was very supportive."
Jackson built the fuselage and installed the instrument panel but he couldn't put on the tail section inside the cramped apartment.
"I had to climb under the wing to go from my dining room into my kitchen it was really a tight fit," Jackson said.
The plane was moved out of his apartment to the Blairstown Airport where a few weeks ago Jackson took its maiden voyage.
"It flew perfectly," Jackson said. "I got up to about 500 feet and I looked over to the wing and thought, 'Well, I built this thing and it's working.'"
