SIMFEROPOL, July 5. /TASS/. A solar-powered plane flown by Russian explorer and voyager Fyodor Konyukhov landed at Tabasko Airfield in Crimea on Saturday to reach its final destination, the airfield’s owner Sergei Shevchuk told TASS.
On Friday, Konyukhov was planning to complete the flight in daylight hours along the following route: Moscow Region (Severka Airfield) - Voronezh (Usman) - Rostov-on-Don (Olginskaya) - Yevpatoriya (Tabasko Airfield). Due to bad weather, his plane landed at Gostagayevskaya Airfield in the Krasnodar Region and continued the flight to Crimea on Saturday morning. The thunderstorm delayed his takeoff from Crimea’s Koktebel Airfield. Russian Gliding Federation President Sergei Ryabchinsky was onboard the flight alongside Konyukhov.
"It’s all right. The plane has just landed. Everything is OK," Shevchuk said noting that such a flight was first in Crimea.
"There has been nothing like that before. It is the first flight of a solar-powered plane in Crimea’s aviation history," he added.
Tabasko is the only airfield in Crimea for aircraft lighter than 5.7 tonnes. It was opened in 2009 and is located in the village of Velikoye in the Saki region. Shevchuk is a member of the same club of round-the-world travelers as Konyukhov. In 2012, Shevchuk flew a light single-engine aircraft from the Crimean spa city of Yevpatoriya to continental Europe’s northernmost point of North Cape, thus setting a non-stop flight record for light aircraft in Ukraine. He covered the distance of 7,333 kilometers in 26 hours 32 minutes.
Preparations for round-the-world flight
Konyukhov’s flight is part of preparations for his solo nonstop solar-powered flight around the world. He flew a unique aerial vehicle dubbed Flying Laboratory, designed specifically to test technological solutions, which will be applied when constructing a plane for the solar-powered flight around the world. The Flying Laboratory plane is equipped with flexible solar panels produced in Russia and energy accumulating systems. Its wingspan is 25 meters, but the weight is only 900 kilograms.
The flight aims to test the solar panels at different altitudes, sun angles and latitudes (from 56 degrees (Moscow Region) to 45 degrees (Yevpatoriya).
In 2021, Fyodor Konyukhov is planning to set out on a solo nonstop solar-powered flight around the world. His Albatros project is funded by Russian ROTEK technological company.
The world aviation history knows only one successful round-the-world flight powered by solar energy: the Swiss Solar Impulse 2 flew around the world in 500 days, making 19 stops along the route. The Russian Albatros project team is working on the plane that can fly around the world without stops and charges in seven days.
Fyodor Konyukhov’s expeditions
So far, Fyodor Konyukhov has sailed around the world five time, crossed the Atlantic Ocean 17 times and became the first Russian to complete the Explorers Grand Slam: he climbed the highest mountains on all seven continents and visited the North Pole and the South Pole. In 2007, Konyukhov circumnavigated the Southern Hemisphere aboard a sailing yacht dubbed the Scarlet Sails when he crossed the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific Oceans. In 2019, he completed solo sailing on a rowing boat across the southern part of the Pacific Ocean, which became the first part of his round-the-world expedition.