Solar Plane Takes Flight To Circle Globe In 180 Days [In Photos]
A pioneering flight around the world will use nothing but sunshine for fuel. In the dusty peach dawn of a desert day, the Solar Impulse 2 airplane took flight at 11:12 PM Eastern time on March 8 from Abu Dhabi on the first leg of a bid to fly around the world exclusively powered by electricity generated from sunlight.
At a top speed of 45 kilometers-per-hour the single-seat airplane flew to Muscat in Oman over roughly 10 hours, touching down at roughly 2:13 PM Eastern time, after a few hours spent circling and waiting for the right weather conditions to land. The plane is an upgraded version of the original Solar Impulse, which flew across the U.S. in 2013; both planes were built by the Solar Impulse group, led by Swiss adventurers Bertrand Piccard and Andre Borschberg.
More details and photos here.