HP Sponsors Plastiki’s 10,000 Mile Voyage

HP’s the official technology provider of the Plastiki, a 60-foot catamaran built out of plastic bottles and recycled materials. The crew will be sailing from San Francisco to Sydney later this year. During the expedition, the crew will be using an HP Elitebook 6930p notebooks and iPAQ 910C smartphones for the crew to use during the journey.

Plastiki’s Mission Control is located at Pier 45 on San Francisco’s historical Fisherman’s Wharf. The Mission Control Center at Pier 45 will be open Wednesdays to Sundays, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Visitors can learn more about how the Plastiki was built and track the Plastiki as it makes the 10,000 mile voyage.

The Elitebooks will be used for mapping and weather applications. The crew will have limited Internet access, but the weather prediction application will be run locally.

The crew’s vital signs will also be fed into the Elitebooks and transmitted back to shore. Visitors to AdventureEcology.com will be able to see how the crew members’ hearts race when they spot rare marine life or are stressed when they hit inclement weather.

Each crew of the six crew members will use an iPAQ 910C to type quick journal entires during the voyage.

I met up with the founders of the Plastiki project and HP’s Satjiv Chahil last week to talk about the project. A video of their presentation is below.