Now the long Pacific Ocean crossing has begun Solar Impulse passes 'point of no return' over Pacific - BBC News While that article suggests no landing alternates, There is Midway Island at least. I don't know of any further west than that.
No not me! Go to the SI2 website! they have what you want to see If they 'get wet' before Midway, you can expect media to tell you more.
Solar Impulse website appears overloaded now, as it often has been during flight. Site has some dandy widgets, but not a big enough pipe (?) Hope they can upgrade for the later Atlantic crossing, because they are gonna get a lot of traffic
A longer vacation in Hawaii to sort out battery overheating Solar Impulse grounded for 2-3 weeks - BBC News Good thing no fire I think much of the structure is flammable
Hangered in Hawaii until 2016 April. Solar Airplane's Round-The-World Trip Is Halted Until 2016 : The Two-Way : NPR
The above statement is wrong. You all have my permission to dump on HKMB. This wacky SI2 aeroplane is fit to fly in a rather small subset of wind conditions. By no means does it demonstrate that commercial PAX will soon be solar flown. It is more like 'can we do this"? Discussing the Solvay $$$ input would take us back to global mercury, and nobody here wants to talk about that.
Honestly, dump on me all you like. I wanted SI2 to succeed, and I wanted it to be a big thing. But if it's going to stop in Hawaii for nine months (and let's face it, given the opportunity, who wouldn't?), and get stuck in Nanjing for weeks (I've been stuck in Nanjing: the traffic is horrific), and stop for several weeks in Nagoya (I've only ever been through it on a train, so I can't comment), then is it really a round-the-world trip? Most of us have cars that have travelled well over 40,000km / 25,000 miles, but I don't think we'd ever say they'd been round the world. What SI2 is doing is just a series of disparate journeys, spread out over a year or so, which happen to have linked start-and-finish points. If they're developing a new way to cool the batteries in Hawaii, It isn't even going to have done the journey based on a single design. When you say, "It is more like, 'can we do this'?", I think the answer has to be no. It's a shame: it's a brilliant project, and I really wanted it to work. But now, if they ever make it back to Abu Dhabi, I think it'll be a real stretch to call it a round-the-world flight.
Heard it on the news a couple days ago...about the heat damage to the Lithium batts. So that's a little bad publicity for Lithium.
Sounds like they under estimated the amount of cooling needed for the batteries in a tropical climate. It's as bad for Li-ion publicity as the early Leafs in Arizona were, or Civic hybrids for NiMH. I agree with hkmb, this isn't really an around the world trip. Nellie Bly got around the world in 72 days by steamship and railroad. The technology for a solar powered, manned plane just isn't ready. A solar powered drone might be able to do the trip soon, but that is because it can fly high enough that the limits of the airframe, or biological crew, won't be such a big issue.
If you want to circumnavigate the world at ~100 km/h with biologicals on board, you plan for many stops. What we have here is a well-designed flyer, and HUGE ground crew making leading-edge weather forecasts. Because it cannot be done otherwise. An uninhabited solar flyer, doing the globe at mostly in the stratosphere would be a simpler proposition. But I don't think that would fire our imaginations.
Rutan Voyager - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia It flew around the world in 9 days with a crew of two and no pit stops. Solar and electric propulsion has limits that I don't expect a manned flight not to need stops, and they aren't going for any speed record, but the stops are for days to weeks. If a layover for a cross country flight of the US meant that the trip took over 48 hours, people would opt for the car. I could swim the English Channel in a wetsuit and life vest, with a boat by my side to supply me with Gatorade and sugary snacks when I felt peckish, and let me get of the water if I got chilly. Not to downplay the existence of the SI2, but it is a fair weather flyer in the age of common place flights. Working on emission free flights is important, but PV cells on the back of a zeppelin would likely garner more interest from the public because unquiness, and it likely would have better trip performance.
True, but it was never a race. It was a technology demonstration...and technology demonstrations are about the only way get public attention on technical subjects. It was getting the attention that mattered, not the circling the world. Sooner or later, there will be attempts to circle the world using just human powered vehicles. The general public will not believe that is possible until someone actually attempts it....and it will not be until someone announces it, that most folks will become aware of how far certain technologies have advanced. Some kid, somewhere following this will be inspired to do impressive things and then accomplish impressive things. First you have to be motivated......
Trollbait, yes! Rutan made a a superb bird that with hydrocarbon fuel that did this thing. They rode above most 'weather' because they could. But they were not completely immune and had a very good team that modified flight paths. SI2 takes no fuel beyond light. It causes them to use more of the troposphere, with an extremely (necessarily) fragile bird. If it ultimately succeeds it will be largely because their weather team did a great job (+luck) in finding adequate 'holes'. Beyond the technological demo of the machine itself, the weather team seems pretty amazing. During the pause I hope to hear more about them. At what rate HKMB or anyone else could walk around the world would be a matter of mild interest. But perhaps not because of any technology it would demonstrate. Unless we are talking about really boingy shoes, or something...
Stratospheric solr drone for internet relay Facebook Is About to Test Its Enormous Solar-Powered Drone | WIRED
