Team to investigate
why Helios broke apart
NASA has named a team of five scientists and engineers who will spend next week on Kauai trying to learn why Helios, an unmanned solar-powered aircraft, broke up 30 minutes into a test flight and crashed into the Pacific Ocean.
The prototype crashed Thursday morning near the Navy's Pacific Missile Range Facility at Barking Sands. The remotely piloted aircraft was traveling at about 21 mph at 3,000 feet when the accident occurred, said Alan Brown, a spokesman for NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center in Edwards, Calif.
Some pieces of the lightweight flying wing were recovered immediately after the crash, and the search continued yesterday for parts floating on the ocean's surface.
"We have helicopters out there looking," said Jenny Baer-Reidhart, a Dryden spokeswoman on Kauai. "We think right now they're still in the area where it splashed down," west of Kauai, near Niihau.
The solar electric, propeller-driven Helios was testing an advanced experimental fuel cell system in preparation for a long-endurance mission of almost two days planned for next month.
There were no injuries and no property damage, except for the loss of the $15 million Helios.
The Helios was far enough from land when it broke up that there were no eyewitnesses on the ground, Brown said.
However, there were four people, including a videographer, in a chase helicopter who may have seen what happened, said Baer-Reidhart.
The investigation will be led by Thomas Noll, of NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va., Brown said. Noll will work with John Brown, of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Forecast Systems Laboratory in Boulder, Colo.; Stephen Ishmael, of the Dryden Flight Research Center; Marla Perez-Davis, of NASA's Glenn Research Center in Cleveland; and Geary Tiffany, of NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif.
NASA officials had initially reported the altitude of the mishap to be 8,000 feet, but Brown said yesterday that he had been given incorrect information.
The Helios Prototype, which looked more like a flying wing than a conventional plane, reached an altitude of 96,500 feet during a nearly 17-hour flight from Barking Sands on Aug. 13, 2001. The altitude, about 18 miles, was considered by NASA to be a record for a nonrocket-powered winged aircraft.