Automakers like to remind consumers how capable their pickups all the time, but if you want a vehicle that can tow anything you hitch to it, a truck apparently isn’t your best bet.
Porsche recently set a Guinness World Record with its midsize SUV, the Cayenne, by towing the Air France Airbus A380 for 42 meters (137.795 feet) at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport in France, according to a press release. The A380 weighs 285 metric tons (628,317 pounds), which is 115 metric tons (253,532 pounds) heavier than the previous heaviest aircraft pulled by a production car.
Porsche GB technician Richard Payne set the record in a Cayenne S Diesel that produces 385 horsepower and 629 foot-pounds of torque using the car’s standard tow bar. He then hopped in a Cayenne Turbo S, which has 570 horsepower and 590 foot-pounds of torque, and repeated the feat.
“We don’t usually go this far to test the limits of our cars but I think today we got pretty close,” Payne said in a statement. “I could tell that it was working hard but the Cayenne didn’t complain and just got on with it. My mirrors were quite full of Airbus, which was interesting. Our cars can go a bit beyond what our customers might expect — they’re designed to be tough.”
In 2012, Toyota did something similar to Porsche when it used a Tundra to tow the Shuttle Orbiter Endeavor in Los Angeles. However, Endeavor weighs just 172,000 pounds, 398,000 pounds less than the Airbus.
What’s more, after performing the stunt, Payne was able to drive the Cayenne back to the U.K. from the Airport.
Thumbnail photo via Porsche
