Cars towing airplanes isn’t really out-of-the-box thinking. Most petrolheads will remember the Volkswagen Touareg V10 TDI, which created quite stir when it towed a Boeing 747, back in 2006. Given the massive coverage this event received, other car brands soon entered the fray to dethrone the record set by the Touareg. Nissan managed to pull a gargantuan 170-tonne cargo plane to set a new record in 2013. The Germans retaliated with the Porsche Cayenne S Diesel last year, which pulled a 285-tonne Airbus A380 for an impressive 73 metres. In fact, last year a video went viral showing a Tata Hexa towing a Boeing 737-800.
Electric Vehicle brand Tesla has now hopped onto the car-towing-airplanes bandwagon. The Tesla Model X P100D towed a Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner at a taxiway in Melbourne Airport at a publicity event by Australian aircraft carrier Qantas. The Model X P100D managed to pull the giant aircraft almost 300m. According to Qantas, this was the first occasion that a production electric car has ever towed a passenger aircraft. Tesla also set a new Guinness World Record for the heaviest tow (130 tonnes) by an electric production car.
EVs are renowned for their massive torque figures and the fact that all this firepower is available at a tap of the accelerator, unlike conventional internal combustion engines. The Tesla Model X P100D’s electric motor generates an impressive 1,072Nm of torque. In comparison, the VW Touareg V10 TDI has a torque rating of 750Nm, while the record-setting Porsche Cayenne S Diesel’s V8 motor churns out 850Nm of peak torque.