Charlie & Tupper England wrote:

NASA?s Helios Crashes Into Pacific Off Hawaii
NASA?s remotely operated, solar-powered Helios prototype aircraft was
destroyed Thursday, June 26, when it inexplicably crashed into the
Pacific Ocean 29 minutes into a checkout flight from the U.S. Navy
Pacific Missile Range Facility (PMRF), Kauai, Hawaii. The aircraft was
at about 3,000 feet above the ocean at about 10:35 local time when the
aircraft broke apart and fell into the ocean, said Frederick Johnsen,
News Chief at NASA Dryden Flight Research Center, Edwards, California.
Helios, which set a world altitude record for winged aircraft, 96,863
feet, in August 2001, was a proof-of-concept, propeller-driven flying
wing designed to operate at extremely high altitudes for long duration.
The Helios Prototype is one of several remotely piloted aircraft funded
by NASA under the Environmental Research Aircraft and Sensor Technology
program and managed by NASA Dryden. The gears are in motion to build a
Helios successor, Johnsen said.

It has never ceased to amaze me the wacko electric airplane lasted as long as it
did. It flies at 15 MPH and has no payload and no excess electrical capacity
to power the payload if there was one. Probably a little 3 MPH zephyr 
breeze drifted in and destroyed it. Good riddance. A gross waste of our tax money.
Write your Congressman to stop NASA from wasting money. They also blew 100
million on the non existent Williams jet and 10 million on the non existent
Continental diesel. Just becasue something can be done does not mean
it should be done.

I helped on the original Gossamer Condor. When the wind came up to
over one MPH we had to bust our butts getting that thing back in the
hangar to keep it from being destroyed.

Paul Lamar
 
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