Eric and Irena Raymond took a lovely Sunseeker Duo flight over the Italian alps near their home in Voghera and edited it all into a video.\u00a0 They designed and built their own solar-powered airplane – Eric’s third.\u00a0 He flew Sunseeker 1 across the US in 1990 in 21 hops. \u00a0A big press conference scheduled for his last landing at Kitty Hawk, NC was a big disappointment since the US invaded Kuwait that day.<\/p>\n
Six Minutes of Great Beauty<\/strong><\/p>\n Their airplane has solar cells arrayed across the wing and horizontal tail, a small battery pack that gets recharged while flying in the sun, and a 22 kilowatt (30 hp) motor on the tail. \u00a0Turning off the motor they can soar on winds wafting up the sides of the mountains.\u00a0 Beeping and electronic noises come from an audio variometer, a sensitive indicator of whether the airplane is climbing or descending. \u00a0All the sounds are ambient. \u00a0Note how quiet the airplane is, even under power.<\/p>\n