Swiss solar powered plane which is in India now, on its first-ever round the world flight, will fly over Bangladesh on Thursday, on way to Myanmar.
Named ‘Solar Impulse’, this aircraft is designed to remain airborne day and night without using a drop of fuel in a campaign for more sustainable use of resources.
Bertrand Piccard and André Borschberg are the first humans to fly around the world in this aircraft. The journey began on Mar 9 from Abu Dhabi.
The Swiss embassy in Dhaka said it had planned to land in Oman, India, Myanmar and China before crossing the Pacific Ocean.
Then it will have stop-over in the US and finally cross the Atlantic Ocean, heading for southern Europe or North Africa and to its point of departure.
The plane’s exceptional aerodynamic performance and energy efficiency which is three times greater than commercial aircraft make it possible to fly using zero-fuel.
A team of technicians and scientists from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL) worked on this ground-breaking project, says the Swiss embassy.
The project began in 2003 with the slogan, “Solar Impulse, an idea born in Switzerland”, and its first aircraft, launched in 2009, undertook inter-continental flights.
“Solar Impulse is a campaign for the more sustainable use of resources and it aims at demonstrating that with clear vision it is possible to go beyond what is currently thought to be possible,” the embassy said in a statement.
It showed Swiss “strengths” in the field of education, research, and innovation.
In India, it first landed in Ahmedabad from where it took off for Varanasi on Wednesday.
From Varanasi it will go to Myanmar. En route, it is expected to fly over Bangladesh on Thursday evening, “if everything goes as planned”.
Source: Bd news24
