Solar Impulse

Solar Impulse

Solar Impulse is the name of a Swiss long-range experimental solar-powered aircraft project, and also the name of the project's two operational aircraft. The privately-financed project is led by Swiss businessman André Borschberg and Swiss psychiatrist and aeronaut Bertrand Piccard, who co-piloted the first balloon to circle the world non-stop. The Solar Impulse project intends to achieve the first circumnavigation of the Earth by a piloted fixed-wing aircraft using only solar power. The prototype aircraft, bearing the Swiss aircraft registration code HB-SIA and often referred to as Solar Impulse 1, is a single-seat monoplane powered by photovoltaic cells and capable of taking off under its own power. It is designed to remain airborne up to 36 hours. The aircraft conducted its first test flight in December 2009. In July 2010, it flew an entire diurnal solar cycle, including nearly nine hours of night flying, in a 26-hour flight. Piccard and Borschberg completed successful solar-powered flights from Switzerland to Spain and then Morocco in 2012, and conducted a multi-stage flight across the United States in 2013.

Update this biography »
Complete biography of Solar Impulse »