Attempting the First Round-The-World Solar Flight to inspire innovation and encourage the use of clean technologies, the solar powered airplane of Bertrand Piccard and André Borschberg successfully landed at the Chongqing Jiangbei International Airport on Tuesday March 31st.
The airplane departed from Myanmar for the fifth leg of its epic circumnavigation on Monday March 30th at 3:36 am local time (9:06 pm GMT, [March 29]) with Swiss pilot Bertrand Piccard in command. The first ever single-seater solar plane to enter China, Solar Impulse 2 landed in Chongqing 20 hours and 29 minutes later, having covered 1,459 kilometers. Flying above the mountainous Chinese provinces of Yunnan and Sichuan required the pilot to perform a steep climb at the beginning of the journey, and due to continuous flying at high altitude, the pilot had to wear an oxygen mask in the 3.8m3 unpressurized cockpit in which Bertrand Piccard faced temperatures descending to minus 20 degrees Celsius. In addition, tackling strong low level winds in Chongqing made this flight one of the most challenging to date.
André Borschberg will be the pilot for the next flight to Nanjing.
The Solar Impulse Official App is now available in the Google Play and iTunes stores.