Technology
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If you’re not already constantly glued to social media, Facebook wants to make sure you’re updating your status wherever you are.
The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please sign in or subscribe to access the full content.The social media giant plans to deliver wireless Internet from the skies using Aquila, a full-scale aircraft capable of beaming wireless Internet using lasers.
Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg announced the completion of Aquila via a Facebook post, of course.
Aquila is named after the northern sky constellation and the bird that carried Zeus’s thunderbolts to battle in Greco-Roman mythology.
The solar-powered aircraft weighs “less than a car” and has the same wingspan as a Boeing 737.
Aquila forms part of the Facebook project Internet.org, aimed at providing affordable Internet access to more communities around the world. "This effort is important because 10% of the world’s population lives in areas without existing internet infrastructure," wrote Zuckerberg.
The broadcasting stats for Aquila are astonishingly accurate for such a craft. To “a point the size of a dime,” Aquila is capable of sending data at 10 gigabits per second from a distance of over 10 miles.
Engineers in the promo video below believe the drone will fly above the Earth at between 18.3 and 27.4 kilometers (60,000 and 90,000 feet) for 3-month periods before descending back down to Earth.
[H/T: Popular Science]
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