不间断环球飞行创下新纪录

Global Flyer Completes Record Nonstop, Round-The-World Flight

不间断环球飞行创下新纪录

 

Thousands of spectators at the Salina airport cheered as Steve Fossett emerged from the cramped¹ cockpit of the Global Flyer and waved.

 

Moments later, he was greeted by Sir Richard Branson, chairman of Virgin² Atlantic Airways³, which had sponsored the flight.

 

Mr. Branson: He is the first person in the world to go around it solo.

 

Then Mr. Fossett addressed the crowd and those listening to live broadcasts of the event worldwide.

 

Mr. Fossett: That was something I wanted to do for a long time, a major ambition. I had the good fortune of having the right people associated with it.

 

The Global Flyer is constructed of carbon fiber⁴ material, which makes it light and flexible, but also capable of carrying the fuel, the engine, the instruments and the pilot at high altitudes.

 

The plane took off from the Salina airport Monday and made it more than half way around the world before mission controllers began to worry about the rate of fuel consumption being registered by on-board fuel gages. On Wednesday, as he flew near Hawaii, Mr. Fossett decided⁵ to continue on, using abundant tail winds to boost his speed and save fuel.

 

When the plane landed, it had fuel to spare, but the aircraft's designers say it would not have made it all the way without the help of the winds. The official time for the flight was 67 hours, two minutes and 38 seconds.

 

Although the flight established a milestone⁶ in aviation history, it is also considered important for having tested some of the innovations built into the craft and its flight operations.

 

The National Aeronautics⁷ and Space Administration, known as NASA, has expressed interest in using the Global Flyer to test new communication systems. The company that built the aircraft, California-based Scaled Composites, also built the Spaceship One craft, which last year won the X-Prize for carrying a pilot and load briefly⁸ out of earth's atmosphere.

 

Greg Flakus, VOA news, Houston.

 

注释：

cockpit [5kCkpit] n. 驾驶员座舱

flexible [5fleksEbl] adj. 灵活的

instrument [5instrumEnt] n. 器具

abundant [E5bQndEnt] adj. 丰富的

aviation [7eivi5eiFEn] n. 飞行

atmosphere [5AtmEsfiE] n. 大气

1 cramped   

a.狭窄的

参考例句：

• The house was terribly small and cramped, but the agent described it as a bijou residence. 房子十分狭小拥挤，但经纪人却把它说成是小巧别致的住宅。
• working in cramped conditions 在拥挤的环境里工作

2 virgin   

n.处女，未婚女子；adj.未经使用的；未经开发的

参考例句：

• Have you ever been to a virgin forest?你去过原始森林吗？
• There are vast expanses of virgin land in the remote regions.在边远地区有大片大片未开垦的土地。

3 AIRWAYS   

航空公司

参考例句：

• The giant jets that increasingly dominate the world's airways. 越来越称雄于世界航线的巨型喷气机。
• At one point the company bought from Nippon Airways a 727 jet. 有一次公司从日本航空公司买了一架727型喷气机。

4 fiber   

n.纤维，纤维质

参考例句：

• The basic structural unit of yarn is the fiber.纤维是纱的基本结构单元。
• The material must be free of fiber clumps.这种材料必须无纤维块。

5 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

6 milestone   

n.里程碑；划时代的事件

参考例句：

• The film proved to be a milestone in the history of cinema.事实证明这部影片是电影史上的一个里程碑。
• I think this is a very important milestone in the relations between our two countries.我认为这是我们两国关系中一个十分重要的里程碑。

7 aeronautics   

n.航空术，航空学

参考例句：

• National Aeronautics and Space undertakings have made great progress.国家的航空航天事业有了很大的发展。
• He devoted every spare moment to aeronautics.他把他所有多余的时间用在航空学上。

8 briefly   

adv.简单地，简短地

参考例句：

• I want to touch briefly on another aspect of the problem.我想简单地谈一下这个问题的另一方面。
• He was kidnapped and briefly detained by a terrorist group.他被一个恐怖组织绑架并短暂拘禁。