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Uber driver sets potential record with 397-mile trip from Virginia to New York

By Ben Hooper
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NEWPORT NEWS, Va., Dec. 13 (UPI) -- A Virginia Uber driver set what might be a new record for the ride sharing service by picking up a fare and driving her 397 miles to New York.

Janis Rogers, 64, of Newport News, said she picked up a young woman outside of a Ben & Jerry's in Williamsburg and the passenger revealed her intended destination was Brooklyn's Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood.

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The woman asked Rogers how far north she could take her.

"I said, 'Well, I'm not doing too much today, so I'll take you all the way," Rogers told the New York Post.

Rogers said the woman slept for the entire 7-hour, 42-minute drive to her boyfriend's house -- a distance of 397 miles.

The driver said her passenger, who paid $294.09 for the trip, did not seem terribly enthused upon their arrival in Brooklyn.

"She didn't seem excited to see her boyfriend," Rogers said. "She was kind of blase. She looked tired."

Rogers said she immediately headed home to Virginia after dropping the woman off, bringing the total time she spent on the journey to 15-1/2 hours.

The driver said she made about $9 an hour during the trip and spent $32 on gas and tolls.

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"This was not lucrative," she said. "I did it because it was an adventure."

Harry Campbell, the Uber driver behind the popular Rideshare Guy blog, said Rogers' June 9 journey broke a 2014 record set by California driver Joe Strandell, who drove a woman 320 miles from Santa Barbara to Palo Alto.

Uber has yet to comment on Rogers' potential record.

The record might be short-lived, however, as Campbell put out a call on his Facebook page to find out if any drivers could best her accomplishment. An Uber driver named Leonard Mongold posted a screenshot from his Uber app that appears to show a March 2016 fare from a trip from Wilmington, N.C., to Austin, Texas. The screenshot says Mongold drove a distance of 1,417 miles over 48 hours.

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