By Alton K. Marsh

Now under construction in Switzerland is a four-motor aircraft destined to
serve as the prototype of a fragile piloted airplane that will circle the
globe on solar power alone.

It will climb during the day to nearly 28,000 feet and descend at night to
3,300 feet. The combined power of the four motors is only 10 horsepower. The
cockpit is unpressurized and unheated; engineers are hoping insulation will
protect the pilot at the higher altitudes. First it must fly, then cross the
Atlantic Ocean.

By 2011 it is hoped the pioneer, Bertrand Piccard, who circled the globe in
the Breitling Orbiter 3 balloon, will be able to do the same in his Solar
Impulse aircraft, although it will take a month (slower than the balloon).

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Isn't 3,300 cutting it kind of close? Also they really need to come up with
a better class name than "fragile piloted airplane."