Solar Impulse 2 World Tour
The Voyager world tour flown in 1984 by Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager was completed non-stop in 9 days, that of the Orbiter III balloon flown in 1999 by Bertrand Piccard and Brian Jones, in 20 non-stop days. Solar Impulse 2 is planned in 10 stages, 25 days and 500 hours of flight. Although this time it is necessarily a world tour with stopover, the flight is nevertheless an extraordinary technical and human challenge. Bertrand Piccard, AAE member, and André Borschberg will successively take the controls, alone on board.
Some stages are planned to last for several days. Considerable work of reflection and preparation have gone into the following subjects: motorisation, sunshine, aerodynamics, autonomy, structures, mass, turbulence, convection, equipment, failures, piloting, navigation, food, fatigue, sleep, cold, heat, oxygen, communication, operational support, medical assistance, diversion, rescue, risk analysis, training, simulation etc.
You can subscribe to the “Solar Impulse Newsletter” to follow this world tour on the website: http://www.solarimpulse.com/fr/#.VMnOi2iG-So
by Claude Nicollier, AAE correspondent, pilot, astrophysicist and astronaut.
He led the tests on Solar Impulse during the years of preparation and gave a presentation on the subject to AAE on 9 October last on the Swiss base of Payn.
