Late last August, a solar-powered drone called Zephyr came within a whisker of breaking one of aviation's most enduring records.

The unmanned aircraft, operated by the United States Army and manufactured by Airbus, flew for 64 days, 18 hours, and 26 minutes before crashing in Arizona, just four hours short of breaking the record for the longest continuous flight ever.

That record was set 64 years ago, in 1959, by Robert Timm and John Cook, who flew a four-seater aircraft for 64 days, 22 hours, and 19 minutes over Las Vegas.

It's remarkable that the Zephyr, a modern light aircraft flying autonomously, not only failed to beat that time, but Timm and Cook would still have held the world endurance record for a crewed flight.

In fact, Timm and Cook's ability to stay in the air for so long in an era closer to the Wright brothers' first flight than today is nothing short of amazing.

The Hacienda hotel and casino, located at the southern end of the Las Vegas Strip, first opened its doors in 1956.

It was one of the first family-oriented resorts in Las Vegas, and in search of publicity, the hotel owner decided to fly a plane with the hotel's name on its side and attempt to break the flight endurance record, which stood at nearly 47 days in the air and was set in 1949.

The employee, a former World War II fighter pilot turned slot machine repairman named Robert Timm, was paid $100,000 to organize the event, which was then linked to a cancer research fundraiser.

Timm spent months modifying his chosen Cessna 172 to suit his needs. The modifications included a mattress to sleep on, a small steel sink for personal hygiene and an autopilot.

"There had been a lot of experiments with aerial refuelling up to this point, but there really wasn't any way to modify a Cessna 172 to be refuelled in midair," says Bednarek. As a result, they set up an additional tank that could be filled from a truck on the ground. When they needed to refuel, they would fly very low and just above stall speed until the truck arrived and winched up a hose and used a pump to transfer fuel into the aeroplane.

Timm's first three attempts at the record were cut short by mechanical failures, the longest of which kept him and his co-pilot in the air for about 17 days. However, the record was broken in September 1958 by another team, also flying a Cessna 172; it now stood at more than 50 days.

Timm chose John Cook, an aeroplane mechanic, as his new co-pilot for his fourth attempt after having problems with his previous one.

On December 4, 1958, they took off from McCarran Airport in Las Vegas. They flew low over a speeding car, as in previous attempts, to paint one of the landing wheels and rule out cheating. The flight began smoothly, and the pair spent Christmas Day in the air. Bathroom breaks were taken on a foldable camp toilet, and the resulting plastic bags were later scattered across the desert. An extendable platform made it easier to shave and bathe, and a quart of bath water was delivered every other day.

Timm fell asleep at the controls on day 36, and the plane flew for over an hour at an altitude of just 4,000 feet. The autopilot had saved their lives, but it would stop working entirely a few days later. The two would take turns sleeping, but the constant engine noise and aerodynamic vibrations made a good night's sleep impossible.

On day 39, the electrical pump that delivered fuel to the plane's tanks failed, forcing them to restart the process manually. When they finally beat the record, on January 23, 1959, the list of technical failures included, among other things, the cabin heater, the fuel gauge and the landing lights: "The important thing was that the engine kept going, which is really kind of remarkable. It's been a long time since I've flown. "Even if you keep it fueled and oiled, the heat and friction will eventually cause problems," says Bednarek.

Nonetheless, the two stayed in the air as long as they could to ensure that their new record would be unbeatable. They flew for another 15 days before landing at McCarran on February 7, 1959, after flying nonstop for more than two months and 150,000 miles.

"They had determined that they had passed the point where no one else would try this - and no one has," Bednarek adds.

“I think they’d reached the end of the rope and decided it wouldn’t have done them any good to crash, and so they came down. They were in pretty bad shape: We know that such a period of inactivity can be very bad for the body, and even though they did move around in the aircraft, they couldn’t stand up or stretch, and they certainly couldn’t exercise or walk around.

“It would be like sitting for 64 days—that is not good for the human body." "They had to be carried out of the aircraft.” Will this record ever be beaten by a human crew? Bednarek believes it could happen only if the attempt involved an aircraft testing some new form of propulsion or energy source, to show its utility.

Anyone aspiring to try, however, should heed the warning of co-pilot John Cook, who said this when a reporter asked if he would ever do it again: “Next time I feel in the mood to fly endurance, I’m going to lock myself in a garbage can with the vacuum cleaner running, and have Bob [Timm] serve me T-bone steaks chopped up in a Thermos bottle." That is until my psychiatrist opens for business in the morning.”