FAI celebrates 10 yearssince Solar Impulse 2’strail-blazing fuel-free circumnavigation

Ten years ago on 26 July 2016, a new chapter in aviation history began as Solar Impulse 2 touched down in Abu Dhabi, successfully completing the first-ever circumnavigation of the globe without using a single drop of fuel.

Swiss pilots Bertrand Piccard and André Borschberg, who flew Solar Impulse 2 alternately over 17 legs, concluded an epic 42,000-kilometre adventure that demonstrated the viability of renewable energy for the future of flight.

Reliant solely on the power of the sun via its 17,248 photovoltaic cells across the 72m wingspan, Solar Impulse 2’s remarkable journey took the two pioneering pilots around the world during 555 hours of flight – during both day and night.

The Solar Impulse 2 circumnavigation resulted in multiple FAI world records in electric and solar-powered aeroplane classes. Notably, Borschberg’s long duration flight , Piccard’s Atlantic crossing distance and Piccard’s altitude record still remain unbeaten, ten years on. Yet Solar Impulse’s overriding objective was not to set records, but to showcase the opportunities for solar powered flight.

In an exclusive 10^th anniversary interview with FAI, Piccard explains the origins of the Solar Impulse idea:

“Solar Impulse really comes from my fear of running short of propane when I flew with Breitling Orbiter 3 in 1999… We had one eighth of the fuel left to cover the last quarter of the world. Thanks to a powerful jet stream over the Atlantic, we made it, but there was only 40 kg of gas left out of the 3,700kg with which we began. The lesson is this: it’s not the sky that is the limit, it’s the fuel!

“That’s why I started to dream of flying without any fuel.”

The project was the culmination of over a decade of research and development between Piccard and Borschberg and the Solar Impulse team. Following the success of the original Solar Impulse inaugural night flight in 2010, the Solar Impulse 2 was launched in 2014, setting the stage for the historic 2015-2016 circumnavigation. The adventure was successfully concluded on 26 July 2016 when Piccard landed the aircraft back where the journey had started, in Abu Dhabi.

While the original Solar Impulse 2 aircraft was lost in the Gulf of Mexico in May 2026 (while operating as the unmanned drone Skydweller) it is clear that the Solar Impulse 2 story will live on as a truly remarkable innovation in harnessing renewable energy for the future of aviation.