What began as a maintenance flight for Solar Impulse 2 on Sunday night became another attempt to fly across the Pacific and finish its round-the-world quest.
The solar-powered plane, due to fly from China to Hawaii four weeks ago, had to land in Nagoya, Japan after running into a storm front. After landing, strong winds and rain led to damage to its wings.
Monday night’s flight “was supposed to be something completely different than usual”, said Bertrand Piccard, a co-pilot and founder of the programme.
“That was our first decision, not to communicate about the take-off because it was a trauma for the team to cancel the flight five minutes before take-off.”
Mr Piccard said the plan was to take a maintenance flight to “the point of no return”. If the weather was good, his fellow pilot Andre Borschberg would continue the flight.
Although the base team found systems problems, it was decided to continue to Hawaii.
The flight was meant to ensure that the damage after landing in Nagoya had been properly fixed.
“There was a long time where we didn’t communicate,” Mr Piccard said. “We were busy fixing problems and when we got to the point of no return we had to make a decision.”
Mr Borschberg is at the helm for the eighth leg – the longest solar-powered flight on record – and is likely to face some challenges in the next five days. The trip is expected to take 120 hours.
Because of unpredictable weather, Mr Borschberg will diverge from the direct route to Hawaii for a smoother journey. The leg is risky because there are few, if any, places to land in case of an emergency.
After almost a full day in the air the pilot has had 40 minutes of sleep. He has trained himself over the past three years to practise yoga and breathing exercises that put him into deep sleep for the 20-minute rest periods.
“We have an airplane that is completely sustainable in terms of energy,” Mr Borschberg said in March. “The thing is, with only one pilot on the plane we need to make him sustainable as well.”
The Masdar-sponsored Solar Impulse 2 left Abu Dhabi on March 9.
nalwasmi@thenational.ae
