Solar powered flight smashes long distance records
The duration is also an absolute record for a solo, un-refuelled journey.
The aircraft’s attempt to be the first plane to fly around the world without a drop of fuel originally took off in March 2015 from Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
On the plane’s 40,000-kilometer route, the pilots Bertrand Piccard and Andre Borschberg are sharing piloting duties as the aircraft stops in cities including Muscat, Oman; Varanasi and Ahmedabad in India; Chongqing and Nanjing in China; and Phoenix, Arizona in the USA.
Andre Borschberg was met in Hawaii by his co-pilot and project partner, Bertrand Piccard who will fly the next four day leg of the flight from Hawaii to Phoenix, Arizona, USA.
From Phoenix, Solar Impulse 2 will head for New York before attempting an Atlantic crossing that will eventually see the plane return to Abu Dhabi.
Solar Impulse 2’s lightweight and large, 72 m wingspan, which is larger than that of the Boeing 747, limits the type of weather conditions the vehicle can handle. Borschberg has had to wait for a month for perfect weather conditions after a first attempt to fly across the Pacific was aborted because of a cold front.
In its second attempt at the crossing the plane had to cross two weather fronts endured turbulence as a consequence.
In Hawaii Piccard told reporters: "Andre’s flight was longer than all the other single-seater flights that had fuel".
"Now you can fly longer with no fuel than you can with fuel. So, what Andre has done is not only a historic first for aviation, it’s a historic first for renewable energies. And this is why we are doing this project."
As many as 17,248 ultra-efficient solar cells have been built into the aircraft’s wing design and they will transfer solar energy to four electrical motors that power the plane’s propellers. The solar cells will be used to recharge four 21 kWh lithium polymer batteries which provided 7.5 kW (10 HP) each.
The Si2 weighs 2,300 kilograms compared to an empty Boeing 747 that weighs some 180,000 kilograms. Top speed for the carbon-fiber-based Si2 is about 45 kph.
Over an optimum 24-hour cycle, the motors can deliver a combined average of about 8 hp (6 kW), which is equivalent to the power used by the Wright brothers’ Flyer, the
first successful powered aircraft that took flight in 1903.
During the global journey the plane expected to fly up to an altitude of 8500 meters during day-time to capture the sun’s rays before dipping down to 1,500 meters when
flying over the oceans.
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