There was some serious concern that they wouldn't find another opportunity with good weather this summer. The Japan - Hawaii leg was the longest planned leg, and really stretched the aircraft's capabilities. If they couldn't find a good weather window in June (near the summer solstice), they faced ever shortening-days, and may have had to wait until next year for another attempt. They may have run out of funding during that year-long wait!<p>I'm glad they made it!
"Now you can fly longer with no fuel than you can with fuel. So, what Andre has done is not only a historic first for aviation, it's a historic first for renewable energies"
Another comment asks about what kind of support was necessary to make this solar-powered flight. It happens that Gizmodo (yeah, I know) has a detailed article about that issue, "Flying a Solar Plane Around the World Takes One Hell of a Ground Crew," published today.<p><a href="http://gizmodo.com/flying-a-solar-plane-around-the-world-takes-one-hell-of-1715625434" rel="nofollow">http://gizmodo.com/flying-a-solar-plane-around-the-world-tak...</a>
FYI this story is a little behind. Borschberg safely landed in Hawaii after a solo flight of some 117 hours - breaking the previous record by a huge amount along with some other ones. You can check out the whole last leg on the flight log, with pics and tweets and such:<p><a href="http://www.solarimpulse.com/leg-8-from-Nagoya-to-Hawaii" rel="nofollow">http://www.solarimpulse.com/leg-8-from-Nagoya-to-Hawaii</a>
Impressive achievement! A further update: Solar Impulse landed today at about 6:00 AM local time in Kalaeloa airport after a 118-hour flight. <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-33383521" rel="nofollow">http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-33383521</a>
Hah, wow, interesting timing. I just finished reading a decent book on Kindle about Solar Impulse: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00Q56MYUC" rel="nofollow">http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00Q56MYUC</a><p>It was a bummer Solar Impulse wasn't able to do the non-stop pacific ocean leg, but still, it's pretty amazing. I'm surprised that this just hasn't picked up more news coverage. :( It's completely historic..