PASADENA, California -- AeroVironment's Helios Prototype has successfully completed another test flight, putting the remotely controlled aircraft one step closer to its goal of reaching altitudes more than twice that traveled by commercial passenger jets.
During the Wednesday morning flight at NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center in Edwards, California, the mammoth-yet-lithe plane stayed aloft for one hour and 44 minutes.
"It went off without a hitch," said Alan Brown, a Dryden spokesman.
Although the dawn test flight kept the plane at altitudes no greater than 600 feet, AeroVironment hopes to eventually fly the prototype to 100,000 feet, making it a workhorse that could conceivably fill the role now played by some conventional Earth-orbiting satellites.
The test flight was the fourth in a series for the plane, whose 247-foot wingspan surpasses that of a Boeing 747.
The flight included putting the airplane -- virtually a 1,640-pound flying wing -- through the paces, including flying at speeds ranging from 19 to 25 mph. At least two more test flights have been tentatively scheduled for this year.
Wednesday's flight also marked the fastest-yet turn rate for the airplane -- five degrees per second, Brown said.
Brown said several vehicles trailed the aircraft from the ground during the flight, including one carrying the pilot.
"There were several times when we couldn't turn as fast as the airplane," Brown said.
For the time being, batteries power the prototype's 14 electric motors. Those will eventually be replaced with solar cells to provide power.
By 2001, AeroVironment engineers hope to equip the plane with solar panels and fly it to 100,000 feet. Two years after that, they will add energy storage "pods" to the plane to allow it to fly at night. At that point, Helios could conceivably fly for months at a time at altitudes in the 60,000- to 70,000-foot range.
In fact, the NASA program sponsoring development of Helios -- Environmental Research Aircraft and Sensor Technology (ERAST) project -- foresees their use as low-Earth orbit satellites to do everything from track storms to function as communications relays.
Unlike conventional satellites, however, an instrument-laden Helios could be landed and sent aloft multiple times.
The Helios Prototype is essentially a modified version of AeroVironment's Centurion, which in turn tips its hat to Pathfinder -- an even earlier version. In 1998, a plane called Pathfinder Plus flew to more than 80,000 feet, setting records both for propeller-driven, and for solar-powered aircraft.
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