UNIQUE PLANE soared high over the Golden Gate Bridge on
Tuesday in a demonstration run of a revolutionary solar-powered aircraft.
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| The Solar Impulse passes over the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, Calif., during a test flight from Moffett Field in Mountain View on Tuesday, April 23, 2013. Solar Impulse's HB-SIA prototype is making its sixth test flight after being reassembled. The plane will then fly across America in stages over May-July from San Francisco to Washington, D.C., and New York City. (Jean Revillard/Rezo/Solar Impulse/Polaris) |
The experimental Swiss-designed Solar Impulse — which
draws all its power from the sun — flew more than 3,000 feet above the Golden
Gate after taking off from Moffett Field near Mountain View on Tuesday morning.
It made a few passes over the span and flew near the Farallon Islands, west and
south of Marin.
Those following the Solar Impulse — which was testing its
wings before a departure next week for a flight across America — were
encouraged to grab binoculars and watch from Conzelman Road in the Marin Headlands.
At 3,500 pounds, Solar Impulse weighs less than a Hyundai
and has the wingspan of a Boeing 747; its four motors each generate only 10
horsepower, about the same as a motor scooter.
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| The Solar Impulse, a solar-powered aircraft, is trailed by a helicopter as it flies over the Golden Gate near Sausalito, Calif., on Tuesday, April 23, 2013. (Marin Independent Journal/Alan Dep) |
Pilot Bertrand Piccard was preparing Tuesday for the
plane's ambitious journey May 1, setting out across America on an adventure
that's not scheduled to finish until early July at New York's JFK Airport.
That's not far from Roosevelt Field on Long Island where Charles Lindbergh took
off in 1927 on aviation's first trans-Atlantic solo flight.
"This airplane could do it nonstop," co-pilot
and project CEO André Borschberg said at press conference in late March at
Moffett Field. "But because the pilot is not as sustainable as the
technology, we have
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limited ourselves to 24-hour flight duration."
The plane isn't really that slow — stops that could last
10 days are planned in four cities along the way — but even with the ability to
fly day and night using only the sun's power, it's no speed demon. With the
wind at its back, the plane cruises at 35 mph, about half the speed of the
airship Hindenburg.
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| Solar Impulse's HB-SIA prototype flies over the San Francisco Bay Area while making its sixth test flight from Moffett Field on Tuesday, April 23, 2013, after being reassembled. (Jean Revillard/Rezo/Solar Impulse/Polaris) |
If all goes well during its first big endurance test,
Solar Impulse will attempt to circumnavigate the globe in 2015. That trip will
require at least one nonstop stint of five days and extremely nervous nights
over the Pacific. The cockpit can only accommodate one pilot at a time, so
Borschberg said he will use meditation and Piccard will hypnotize himself while
the plane flies on auto-pilot.
The plane looks like something you might install on your
roof, although if all goes well during test flights, it won't actually end up
there. It's basically a giant wing with a glider's fuselage and a Port-A-Potty
attached. That's where the project's Swiss big cheeses, Piccard and Borschberg,
sit in chilly solitude.
From wingtip to wingtip, Solar Impulse is wider than a
jumbo jetliner, and yet everything else about it is meant to be lean and mean.
It draws all
The Solar Impulse, a solar-powered aircraft, flies over
wisps of fog over the Marin Headlands near Sausalito, Calif. on Tuesday, April
23, 2013. The airplane has a wingspan of over 200 feet. (IJ photo/Alan Dep)
Alan Dep
its power from 12,000 solar cells, each the thickness of
a human hair, with the energy stored in a lithium polymer battery nearly
identical to the one that powers the Tesla Model S.
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| The Solar Impulse, the experimental airplane, comes in for landing after a test flight at Moffett Airfield in Mountain View, Calif. Friday morning April 19, 2013. (Patrick Tehan/Staff) |
A balloonist who circled the planet in 1999, Piccard is a
natural born adventurer, following a path similar to his grandfather Auguste, a
renowned balloonist, and father Jacques, who in 1960 became the first to
explore the Mariana Trench in a submarine.
"When I was a child, I was reading books about
exploration, about aviation, about the conquest of space," he said. His
family moved to the U.S. because of his father's work in 1968, a year before
Apollo 11 landed on the moon, propelling Bertrand into suborbital flights of
fancy. "Then I saw that the reality was much better than the dream."
To bring the decade-long dream to life, the project's
co-founders have assembled a lineup of 80 sponsors.
Even in the darkened hangar at the late March press
conference, the sun always seemed to be shining on Solar Impulse, with one
speaker after another extolling its promise. But the technology has aroused at
least modest skepticism.
"This is something to capture the imagination of
kids, of innovators," said Ben Lenail, director of business development at
AltaDevices, a Sunnyvale company that manufactures thin solar cells with a far
more practical application — powering drones already used by the military.
"You have to have everything go right. It's a beautiful dream, but in
terms of practical application, I think we're still about 15 years away."
Article and Photos are sourced From Marin IJ
Link to Origional Article:
http://www.marinij.com/sausalito/ci_23091361/solar-plane-makes-flight-over-golden-gate-bridge?source=most_viewed
