Good to hear that them across the pond have eventually discovered LoRa.
The distances reported are as expected really, all normal.
I have a nearby 40km hilltop to hilltop link across the Bristol Channel in South Wales.
Way back in time, 2014, when LoRa was little known, rather than just test for a 'record' I wanted to know how well LoRa would actually perform as in how much power was needed to achieve a link. So I used a decending power method of testing and with LoRa settings of Spreading Factor 8, bandwidth 41.7khz at 434Mhz using plain 1/4 wire antennas, the 40km link was covered with 3dBm of transmit power, the 40km was a LoRa land record at the time.
Based on those tests I suggested that the LoRa devices would be capable of circa 622km LOS at low data rates but a lot though this was a bit looney tunes, but it was 2015.
Also in 2014 there had been high altitude balloon flights in the UK using LoRa, ground to balloon distances of 400km were recorded.