Not Just Any Plane – It’S A Solar Ship !

The phone began ringing just after 1 AM January 13, 2010.  My husband rolled over and looked at the caller ID.  It’s Marcy he said, as he pressed the answer button and held the phone up so we both could hear at the same time.  Guys, I need your help, were the first breathless words we heard.

Dr. Marcy and I had been best friends for over thirty years.  We had met in Laboratory Technology School in Fort Lauderdale.  I was a single mother with two small boys, she a lone free spirit on her way to becoming a pediatrician whose life mission would become serving the poorest children in the United States and around the world. Years later when my husband Jeff, a nurse, and I a Laboratory Technologist, had meet working at a hospital in Texas, Marcy had been my maid of honor.

You heard about the earthquake in Haiti, she asked.  Jeff and I looked at each other in the dim light of our bedroom both knowing where the question was leading.

Six years earlier, the day after the December 26^th 2004 earthquake and Tsunami that had hit Indonesia we had received almost the same call.  In less than 3 days Marcy had mobilized hospitals, doctors and nurses here in Florida for donations and Marcy along with several others had traveled to Banda Aceh for a month to help in the rescue, recovery and treatment of the people of Indonesia.  We worked as her logistical support here in the states to get supplies in.

   Now the scenario was repeating.  I have already started putting together a team, she said, I want you and Jeff to work on logistics again, and we need to be able to leave in two days.  The airport in Port-au-Prince is closed, planes and helicopters can’t get in, the hospitals and most of the houses are rubble.  They will need blood, medical supplies, food, water, and shelters.  We will have to bring everything by boat and ships from Fort Lauderdale and Miami.

  Can I count on you, was the question we were both waiting to hear.  I looked into Jeff’s eyes, they looked very sad but committed and unwavering, slowly, he nodded his chin once.  Yes, I said, were in.  Once again we started mobilizing everyone we knew, making phone calls, calling in favors. Everyone we contacted wanted to help in whatever way they could, coming together in a whirlwind of controlled chaos to move as quickly as possible, because time was the most precious commodity when trying save lives.

In the days that followed the inability to get relief workers and supplies in were the most exasperating and difficult part of trying to help.  Supplies rolled in quickly to Fort Lauderdale, Miami and many other parts of the United States and world, people gave clothing, food, water, tents, generators, gasoline, blood and medical supplies.  Yet while the people of Haiti waited, many of those supplies languished in warehouses and on docks waiting for a way to get them on the ground to the people who needed them most.

   In both Indonesia and Haiti supplies would eventually slowly trickle in, but the logistics of getting these supplies in was the hardest part of trying to help.

Three days later, shortly before noon Friday, the Federal Aviation Administration issued a ground stop alert for Port-au-Prince airport.  It read- "Due to no available ramp space at the Port-au-Prince airport and with the international heavy jets inbound the Haitians are not accepting any aircraft into their airspace," the alert says. "Airborne aircraft can expect to hold in excess of one hour. Aircraft operators are also reminded that there is no available fuel at the airport."

The port also took heavy damage in the earthquake, with the cranes used to offload container ships toppled. For the moment, it does not appear that large ships can dock at the port.  This was the situation we faced.

The reason I am relating this story to you is because today, I was made aware of a very different, new, and special kind of airplane.  One that is uniquely qualified to not only meet these kinds of disasters, but many other situations in which lack of runways, fuel and isolated locations can now be overcome.

   It’s called the SOLAR SHIP and it comes in three sizes.

   The brain child of Canadian Jay Godsall, founder and chief executive of Solar Ship, says his aircraft will be able to go where no roads are built, where landing locations are too small or have been destroyed, and where existing airplanes and helicopters can’t reach on a single tank of fuel.

  In an October 14^th 2011 interview with the Toronto Star, Godsall points out the need for this type of aircraft in his own words. He said “when a magnitude 7.0 earthquake struck Haiti on Jan. 12, 2010, it took eight days before supplies and other aid could be delivered to the city of Jacmel.

Roads from the capital, Port-au-Prince, were blocked. The small airstrip and fuelling infrastructure in Jacmel were too damaged to accommodate supply flights from the closest U.S. city, Miami. “Nobody could land,” says Godsall. “If we could make a similar run, and do it here in Ontario, it would be an irrefutable demonstration of our aircraft.”

Not quite an airship, not quite an airplane, the Solar Ship is a hybrid of both. The delta-shaped aircraft is filled with helium, but slightly less than what’s required to lift it off the ground.

Solar panels across the top of its body, backed up by a lithium-ion battery system, supply enough electricity to drive it forward and into the air. In this way, the design achieves just the right balance of static lift (like a blimp) and aerodynamic lift (like a plane). Perfect for short take off and landings. (STOL).  
No fuel is required for this sun-charged ship -- a significant implication for disaster relief situations, remote areas with no infrastructure and for places that cannot be reached on one tank of fuel.

   The Solar Ship isn’t really designed to compete with jets or even propeller powered airplanes. At one end spectrum the Solar Ship is likely competing against helicopters which are very expensive to operate and have limited load carrying capacity, and at the other end it’s competing against trucks driving very slowly along primitive roads in remote corners of the world.

   The aircraft is not fast. The company lists three sizes that are being developed with a top cruise speed of 75 miles per hour. But the smallest Solar Ship on the drawing board has a payload of more than 1,600 pounds and a range of almost 1,600 miles. Next up is one projected to have a payload of more than 5,500 pounds that can be carried more than 3,000 miles. The one that stretches the imagine the furthest with a payload of more than 66,000 pounds is designed for a range of more than 3,700 miles. Of course the range also translates to endurance if observation – science or military – is how you want to use any of these aircraft.

The company points out that such heavier-than-air airships provide numerous advantages over their lighter-than-air brethren. Firstly, no mooring infrastructure or ballast weight is required to keep the aircraft from floating away during loading or unloading, making them more practical for the remote locations in which they are designed to operate. Additionally, not relying on buoyancy for lift means the aircraft can be smaller than lighter-than-air aircraft carrying the same payload. They are also more structurally robust and more maneuverable and resistant to wind and weather conditions.

   Solar Ship - transportation without depending on things that often aren’t available in remote areas – fossil fuels, roads, or runways.  

To learn more and see a video of this ground breaking aircraft go to http://solarship.com/

or watch on YouTube:


When you see it I think your reaction might just be like mine- Is this cool or what  and it can help save lives.

E3Wise