The Solar Impulse 2’s anticipated flight into the Lehigh Valley was going smoothly as of late Wednesday afternoon, according to the solar-powered airplane’s Twitter account. The cabinet distributes the fan power needed to keep the mobile hangar inflated.
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The Solar Impulse team had to make sure the lightweight plane was still flightworthy.
The Solar Impulse 2, which weighs roughly the same as a family vehicle, contains 17,000 solar cells that power the aircraft’s propellers and charge batteries.
The Swiss-based Solar Impulse effort was founded by Piccard and Borschberg to demonstrate environmentally friendly technologies, with $150 million in backing from corporate partners.
The French navy said Monday that one of its ships has arrived in the search area to help look for traces of EgyptAir Flight 804 that crashed in the Mediterranean and especially for its flight recorders. In each flight we have the impression when we fly, to jump into the future, to be in a moment of science fiction. We’re still in a world that pollutes, that depletes natural resources, that makes pollution. However, its average speed is only about 40 miles per hour. Piccard could easily drive a vehicle from Dayton to Lehigh Valley in less time.
The slow-moving, single-seat plane with the massive wingspan of a Boeing 747 has traversed much of the globe in stages since taking off March 9, 2015 from Abu Dhabi, with Piccard and Borschberg, a Swiss businessman, alternating in the cockpit.
In a two-month trek in 2013, the Swiss pilots flew Solar Impulse 1 coast-to-coast across the United States, landing in Cincinnati along the route. Solar Impulse says that the airplane will now spend several days on the ground as engineers search for damage.
The plane’s longest leg was a five-day trip from Japan to Hawaii. Since then, it has made trips from northern California to Phoenix, Arizona, then on to Tulsa, Oklahoma, before heading to Ohio.
The flight into the Lehigh Valley had been delayed by a day when the aircraft came in contact with fabric in its mobile hangar.
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Solar Impulse 2 flies at the speed of 41mph.
