Gadgetory

something went wrong with one of Facebook's massive solar power drones and now the US National Transportation Safety Board is investigating the accident the US agency said the craft experienced a structural failure when it was coming in for a landing during a test flight in June and the damage compromised the aircraft some are calling it a crash the low-altitude test flight lasted a little over an hour and a half the drone called Aquila weighs less than a thousand pounds it has the wingspan of a Boeing 737 and is designed to stay in the air for 90 days at a time to deliver high-speed internet access facebook is testing these giant drones as a way to get more people online in hard-to-reach areas where there isn't built out infrastructure you see if Facebook can get more people connected to high-speed Internet more people will use Facebook this accident certainly puts a snag in those plans although back in July Facebook called this first test flight a success this isn't Facebook's first setback on the mission to get more people online facebook also was planning to test out a satellite to deliver internet access to parts of africa but that plan went up in smoke literally because it was stored aboard the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket that exploded during a test in September Facebook's not the only tech giant on a quest to sell internet services to underserved parts of the world we're in the middle of a broadband space race the company one web backed by virgin group and other prominent companies is working on building 900 satellites that will be used to provide internet across the globe and Elon Musk's SpaceX has a similar idea last week SpaceX filed an application to the Federal Communications Commission to launch more than 4,400 satellites into low orbit for its own internet service it's expected to be a 10 billion dollar project I'm Bridget Carey you can keep up with the biggest tech stories at cnet com