Facebook solar-powered Internet drone completes test flight

San Francisco

FACEBOOK Inc said on Thursday that it had completed a successful test flight of a solar-powered drone that it hopes will help it extend Internet connectivity to every corner of the planet.

Aquila, Facebook's lightweight, high-altitude aircraft, flew at a few thousand feet for 96 minutes in Yuma, Arizona, chief executive Mark Zuckerberg wrote in a post on his Facebook page. The company ultimately hopes to have a fleet of Aquilas that can fly for at least three months at a time at 18,290 metres and communicate with each other to deliver Internet access.