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• n  strong lightweight wood of the balsa tree used especially for floats
• n  forest tree of lowland Central America having a strong very light wood; used for making floats and rafts and in crafts

• As a child in Atlanta, that meant balsa-wood planes and train sets.
• THOR HEYERDAHL, 87, unorthodox Norwegian adventurer-anthropologist who in 1947 sailed the Kon-Tiki, a tiny balsa raft, from Peru to an island near Tahiti in an attempt to prove his .
• Last week, the balsa was almost ready to sail.

• balsa wood
• Ochroma lagopus

News & Articles

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• Solar-powered plane will have down-to-earth energy benefits - Tue, 18 Jun 2013 PST
  CHANTILLY, Va. – The plane parked outside the airport looks more like a giant exotic insect or maybe an outsized balsa wood toy airplane. When it’s in flight, there’s no ...
  June 18, 2013 - The Spokesman-Review
• Official: Solar plane to help energy use on ground
  The plane parked outside the airport looks more like a giant exotic insect or maybe an outsized balsa wood toy airplane. When it's in flight, there's no roar of jet engines. It's strangely quiet. And as ...
  June 17, 2013 - Associated Press via Yahoo! News
• Official: Solar plane to help energy use on ground - Quincy Herald-Whig | Illinois & Missouri News, Sports
  CHANTILLY, Va. (AP) - The plane parked outside the airport looks more like a giant exotic insect or maybe an outsized balsa wood toy airplane. When it's in flight, there's no roar of jet engines. It's strangely quiet. And as it crisscrosses America, the spindly plane doesn't use a drop of fuel.
  June 17, 2013 - Quincy Herald-Whig

Quotes

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• Burt Rutan in CBS News
  I was fascinated by putting balsa wood together and seeing how it would fly,Rutan says. "And when I started having the capability to do contests and actually win a trophy by making a better model, then I was hooked."