CAIRO, Jul. 13 (Aswat Masriya) – The zero-fuel aircraft Solar Impulse 2 landed in Cairo on Wednesday to finish the penultimate flight of its tour around the world.

The aircraft  took off from Seville in southern Spain at 04:20 GMT on Monday with pilot Andre Borschberg behind the controls, and  touched down in Egypt at 7:10am local time (5:10 GMT), taking almost 49 hours to make the 3,745-km (2,327-mile) trip.

The plane passed through Algerian, Tunisian, Italian and Greek airspace as well as over the Giza Pyramids before landing at Cairo International Airport.

The trip to Cairo was the plane's next to last flight. Borschberg’s colleague and co-pilot Bertrand Piccard will complete the challenge by flying the plane back to Abu Dhabi, where the aircraft began its journey around the world on March 9, 2015.

Borschberg and Piccard took turns over the entire tour. After landing in Cairo, they met with Egypt's minister of Civil Aviation Sherif Fathy where they discussed the potential of alternative energy sources and new technologies.

The aircraft has a 72-meter wingspan which is wider than that of a Boeing 747 and weighs 2.3 tonnes. It has more than 17,0000 solar cells built in to its wings to harness the sun's energy and has an average speed of 70 kilometers per hour at a maximum altitude of 28,000 feet.

The aircraft, which made a total of 17 stops, recorded the longest non-stop solar-powered flight in terms of distance and duration during its journey from Japan to Hawaii as it landed after flying for 8,924km in four days, 21 hours and 52 minutes.

Click here to see more images of Solar Impulse 2 landing in Cairo