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Around the world, powered by nothing but the sun. This kind of sums up the story of the two pilots, Bertrand Piccard and André Borschberg, both pioneers, innovators, and, above all, avant-gardists.
While Bertrand Piccard is a doctor, psychiatrist, explorer and aeronaut, who made the first non-stop round-the-world balloon flight and is the initiator and chairman of the Solar Impulse team; André Borschberg, is an engineer and graduate in management science, a fighter pilot and a professional airplane and helicopter pilot and is also the co-founder and CEO of Solar Impulse.
Sitting under the 72-metre long wings of the world's first only solar powered aircraft, Solar Impulse 2 (in fact, the length of just one wing is enough to hold an entire press conference), Piccard and Borschberg say that stopping over at India wasn't really a random choice. The Solar Impulse mission is looking at gathering many fighters for its cause of clean energy from the country.
"It is one of the largest countries of the world, and when last year we started contacting India, we had a great response. In fact, we had invitations from both the Delhi and Mumbai airports to land our plane there. We chose Ahmedabad, as there is a part of Ahmedabad (Gujarat) in this plane," said Piccard referring to companies who have partnered in the project and have presence in Gujarat. In fact he had met Prime Minister Narendra Modi four years ago (when Modi was the chief minister of Gujarat), and discussed about the project.
"He had shown keen interest in the project then," says Piccard, adding on a lighter note that, "We thought we would meet Mr. Modi again, but he has already left for Delhi." Piccard, Borschberg have started a platform called the futureisclean.org which asks people to pledge "I want concrete actions for a clean future", and are hoping to add signatures for the cause from India. "In India, we can potentially have 1.2 billion signatures," says Piccard.
India's contribution to the project is not just limited to technology, Borschberg has been training under a Geneva-based yoga instructor of Indian origin, Sanjeev Bhanot to help him survive the grueling physical challenge of flying the aircraft for long hours sitting inside a cramped cockpit.
Bhanot explains that yoga has techniques that allows one to maintain a steady body temperature naturally. Techniques like nauli, suryabhedi, and a combination of pranayams including bhastrika and kapalbhaati are performed regularly by Borschberg along with stretching exercises.
Flying the single-seater craft can be a huge human challenge. While the plane never needs to stop, it can fly forever, the halts are there as the pilots need to take breaks. The seat can be maneuvered into a horizontal position so that they can strech out, do yoga or even relax. As such the pilots are allowed to sleep for only 20 minutes at a stretch repeating it 12 times a day, informs a ground staff working with the Solar Impulse team. "They are allowed to have only 2.5 litres of water, around 1.5 litres of energy drinks, and around 2.5 kg of food per day," she informs. Nestle has developed specially packaged food for the purpose.
While Piccard has always wanted to come back to India, ever since he flew over the country in his balloon, Borschberg is keen on the halt in Varanasi as a spiritual stopover. "Last time I flew over India, my balloon was hardly 300 meters above the ground. I could see children running and waving at me, the aroma from the kitchens nearby, and I knew I had to come back," Piccard says.
And this time around they are stopping over at Ahmedabad for four days, before they move on to Varanasi.
