Private industry’s first supersonic flight in history was achieved yesterday as Boom Technology took to the skies in its demonstrator aircraft XB-1 at the Mojave Air & Space Port in California, piercing the sound barrier at Mach 1.122.
The test flight is seen as a pivotal moment in Boom's journey towards rolling out its Overture - the world's second supersonic commercial airliner.
Flown by Boom Chief Test Pilot Tristan “Geppetto” Brandenburg, the XB-1 entered the supersonic corridor and reached an altitude of 35,290 feet before accelerating to Mach 1.122 - 750mph (1207km/h) - breaking the sound barrier.
The event marked the world’s first independently developed supersonic jet and the first civil supersonic jet made in America and paved the way for Boom’s Overture - aiming to be the world’s next supersonic airliner since the Concorde.
“XB-1’s supersonic flight demonstrates that the technology for passenger supersonic flight has arrived,” Boom founder and CEO Blake Scholl said.
Making history
Those of you may remember the British-French collaboration on the Concorde passenger jet - some readers may have even been lucky enough to fly in one.
The aircraft was decommissioned some 20 years ago because of fuel inefficiencies; and when Air France Flight 4590 crashed near Paris in 2000 killing all 109 people aboard, the Concorde’s fate was sealed.
Outside military-spec aircraft and the Concorde, only the failed Soviet Tupolev Tu-144 and Boeing’s outrageously optimistic 2707 carrier (which never materialised) have been attempted since.
Historically, supersonic aircraft have been built and commissioned on the nation-state level (such as the almighty Concorde or fighter jets), developed by militaries and governments since the very first of its kind flew on the back of World War II.
‘The Right Stuff’
On October 14, 1947 and 45,000 feet above the Mojave desert, U.S. Air Force Captain Chuck Yeager ascended into history aboard the military prototype Bell X-1, a rocket-powered aircraft that looked like a bullet with wings.
He was thinking only one thing on that day, as was the military; the key was to break the elusive sound barrier that only scientists had hypothesised with a high degree of confidence until then.
A four-chambered rocket engine delivering 6,000 pounds of thrust propelled the ‘Glamorous Glennis’ aircraft (named as a tribute to his wife) X-1 right up to Mach 1.06, shattering any doubt about a sound barrier being but a myth.
The sonic boom earmarked a new era of aviation between Bell Aircraft and America’s National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) - which later became today’s NASA.
Yeager became the first commandant of the USAF Aerospace Research Pilot School and trained America’s first astronaut, which was depicted in the Academy Award-winning 1983 Hollywood film, The Right Stuff.
So it was only fitting that Boom Supersonic would go back to that very same patch to showcase its supersonic vision.
“A small band of talented and dedicated engineers has accomplished what previously took governments and billions of dollars,” Scholl said.
“Next, we are scaling up the technology on XB-1 for the Overture supersonic airliner. Our ultimate goal is to bring the benefits of supersonic flight to everyone.”
Overture
With 130 deals in the making including signed offtake agreements with American, United and Japan Airlines, the XB-1's success bodes well for Boom's planned Overture airliner.
That's because the XB-1 incorporates many of the key features found on Overture, such as carbon fibre composites, digital stability augmentation, and an augmented reality vision system for landing visibility.
Boom completed construction of its Overture Superfactory in North Carolina last year for the mass production of its Overture supersonic airliner; where it will eventually employ over 1,700 workers and aims to produce 33 Overture jets per annum once the factory hits nameplate capacity.
In the future, the Overture airliner could haul passengers almost halfway around the world from L.A. to Melbourne direct in just 8.5 hours.
