Nanjing to build mobile hangar for Solar Impulse 2

The Solar Impulse II, the first solar-powered plane scheduled to circumnavigate the world, arrives at Ahmedabad in India, March 10, 2015. (Photo provided to China News Service)

(ECNS) - A 16,000-square-meter mobile inflatable hangar will be built at Nanjing Lukou International Airport for the arrival of the Solar Impulse 2, the world's biggest solar-powered airplane.

The Solar Impulse 2 will arrive in Southwest China's Chongqing municipality on March 21, and will land in Nanjing, Jiangsu province on March 22, the Modern Express reported on Tuesday.

The inflatable hangar will include exhibition and support areas with good wind and sand resistance, rain-proofing, and lightening prevention functions, according to a statement.

The Solar Impulse 2 is the only airplane able to fly day and night without fossil fuel energy or polluting emissions. It will fly around the world in stages using only solar energy from March 2015 to the end of the Northern Hemisphere summer.

During the flight, the plane will land at Chongqing Jiangbei International Airport for one day due to technical requirements and in Nanjing for one month for academic exchanges, according to Edelman Public Relations Worldwide.

Swiss pilots Bertrand Piccard and Andre Borschberg will be available to the media, along with staff from the Swiss embassy in China, representatives of the Nanjing government, and partners of the activity, the report says.

The route will cross the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans. Piccard and Borschberg will take turns in the cockpit and will have strong support from a team of physicists, mechanical and aerospace engineers, structural and aerodynamics experts, and composite materials professionals.

The Solar Impulse 2 is now landing in Ahmed Bach, one step further in its round-the-world solar flight, says the report.