A solar-powered airplane finished crossing the United States on Saturday, landing in New York City after flying over the Statue of Liberty during its historic bid to circle the globe, the project team said. The spindly, single-seat experimental aircraft, dubbed Solar Impulse 2, arrived at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport at about 4 a.m. local time after it took off about five hours beforehand at Lehigh Valley International Airport in Pennsylvania, the team reported on the airplane's website. Such a pleasure to land in New York! For the 14th time we celebrate sustainability," said the project's co-founder Andre Borschberg on Twitter after flying over the city and the Statue of Liberty during the 14th leg of the trip around the globe. The Swiss team flying the aircraft in a campaign to build support for clean energy technologies hopes eventually to complete its circumnavigation in Abu Dhabi, where the journey began in March 2015. The solar cr...
The races were hard fought and - according to the commentators - full of thrills and spills. The stadium was empty, apart from a box full of journalists protected by a net, but perhaps in a few years' time huge crowds will gather to watch drone racing. We've heard today how ESPN plans to turn drone racing into a major TV sport - but before it's ready for live spectators, a few issues will need to be sorted out. Such as how can you actually see what is going on. As the tiny drones whizzed past me last night it was almost impossible to spot them, let along work out who was winning. But the organisers of the event, the mobile network EE, the chip maker Qualcomm and this new sport's organising body the European Rotor Sports Association believe that together they can create an absorbing live experience. We were shown two other views of the races. First, via the FPV (first person view) headsets the racers themselves wear to guide their drones with amazing skill aro...