Solar Impulse 2, piloted
by Swiss adventurer Andre Borschberg, flies over the Statue of Libery in
New York Saturday, June 11, 2016 shortly before landing at John F.
Kennedy International Airport. (Jean Revillard/ SI2 via AP)
NEW YORK—After crossing Asia, the Pacific Ocean, and America, Solar Impulse 2 arrived
in New York at 4 a.m. on Saturday, June 11. The solar powered aircraft
that uses no fuel flew over the Statue of Liberty before landing at JFK
International Airport.
The aircraft took off from Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania at midnight.
And after a short flight, entered the bay over the Verrazano Bridge at
an altitude of 1500 feet from 2:00 am to 3:15 am EDT.
The flight is part of an attempt to achieve the first ever round-the-world solar flight with a goal to demonstrate the power of clean technologies.
Swiss innovators and pilots Bertrand Piccard and Andre Borschberg
launched the Solar Impulse project in 2003 and started building the
revolutionary aircraft. After 12 years of research and development, they
initiated their journey in 2015 to show it is possible to save our
planet by using clean energy.
The plane is not being used for commercial purposes or to carry passengers. It was built to convey a message.
“The problem with our society is that, despite all the grand talk
about sustainable development, we are a long way from making use of the
clean technologies that are already available to us. Those solutions
bring opportunities to create jobs, make profit, sustain the growth of
the industry, and at the same time protect the environment,” said
Bertrand Piccard on the group’s website.
It is not the first solar airplane, but it is the first to fly day
and night only using energy stored during day flights in its batteries.
This allows the plane to cross oceans and complete a tour around the
world.
The Journey
Solar Impulse 2 flies over San Francisco before landing at Moffett Field on April 23, 2016. (AP Photo/Noah Berger)
The aircraft began its journey around the globe in March 2015 in Abu
Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. It landed in Hawaii on July 3, five days
after its departure from Japan—having set a record, at 4,000 miles, for
the longest distance traveled by a solar-powered aircraft without
stopping. However, that flight took a toll on the aircraft and its
batteries overheated during the flight.
Due to time needed for extensive repair of the batteries and the
changing seasons, the pilots had to postpone their next attempt this
spring. The plane took off again from Hawaii in April 2016 and landed in
San Francisco after flying 62 hours.
Solar Impulse 2 has traveled from San Francisco to Phoenix, Phoenix
to Tulsa, Tulsa to Dayton, and Dayton to Allentown, Lehigh Valley.
After New York City, it will continue its journey across the Atlantic
before reaching Abu Dhabi where the adventure started in March 2015.
The Solar Impulse 2 is doing its around-the-world flight in a total
of 10 stages with a total travel distance of about 22,000 miles. The
cruising speed is between 28 mph and 56 mph, depending on the altitude.
And the aircraft has over 17,000 solar cells.
The Visionaries
Solar Impulse 2 flies over San Francisco on April 23, 2016. (AP Photo/Noah Berger)
Borschberg, 64, is the CEO of Solar Impulse. He is an engineer by
education and a graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
(MIT) in management science. He is experienced in creating and managing
companies, as well as in flying.
He first joined McKinsey as a consultant for five years, before
starting his own entrepreneurial activities. His passion for aviation
and his interest in innovative solutions led him to team up with Piccard
to found Solar Impulse—and be one of the pilots.
Piccard, 58, is the chairman. He studied medicine, completing a
double major in psychiatry and psychotherapy. He specialized in therapy
under hypnosis and became a teacher and supervisor at the Swiss Medical
Hypnosis Society.
An enthusiastic aviator, he also obtained licenses to fly balloons,
airplanes, gliders, and motor-gliders. He made the first ever non-stop
around-the-world balloon flight. As a balloon pilot, he used his
hypnosis skills during the first transatlantic balloon race, which he
won in 1992.
The pilots both use yoga techniques including meditation to face the
physical, psychological, emotional and spiritual challenges during the
flights. The meditation also allows them to address the difficulties of
warming the body with little available oxygen and cooling the body in
the heat of the sun.
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