Shanghai: The record-breaking Solar Impulse 2 landed safely in Nagoya, Japan tonight on an unscheduled stop caused by bad weather over the Pacific. A live stream from mission control in Monaco showed flight controllers erupting in cheers and applause as the plane touched the tarmac in central Japan.

The high-tech aircraft had set off from Nanjing in China more than 40 hours earlier, bound for Hawaii, a distance of some 8,500 kilometres that it was expected to cover in a six-day, six-night non-stop flight.