Flight Global reports, “Boom Supersonic’s successful second test flight of its XB-1 demonstrator on 26 August positions the company to accelerate the pace of the flight-test programme, with a third flight potentially coming next month.”
Full Story (Flight Global – Subscription Publication)
Tag: XB-1
Boom Receives FAA Clearance for XB-1 Supersonic Tests
Aviation Week reports, “In what the FAA has termed ‘a major federal action,’ the U.S. aviation regulator has granted Boom permission to conduct supersonic overland tests of the company’s XB-1 demonstrator. The special flight authorization (SFA) is the first ever issued by the FAA for tests of a civil supersonic aircraft, as all non-military aircraft are currently prohibited from operating above Mach 1 over land in the U.S.”
Full Story (Aviation Week)
Boom Supersonic to Test Fly Supersonic XB-1 Jet In 2021
SPACE reports that Boom Supersonic recently announced that it plans to fly a supersonic jet demonstrator in 2021. The demonstrator, XB-1, “will be 71 feet (22 meters) long and made of carbon composite, allowing it to remain resilient to flying faster than the speed of sound, the company said in an October statement.” Boom Supersonic Founder and CEO Blake Scholl said, “XB-1 is an important milestone towards the development of our commercial airliner, Overture, making sustainable supersonic flight mainstream and fostering human connection.” Boom Supersonic said that it hopes to do full-scale flight testing in 2025 to prepare for passenger flights later in the decade.
Full Story (SPACE)
Commercial Supersonic Travel Could Shrink the World
Panelists: Moderator Peter Coen, project manager of commercial supersonic technology, NASA’s Langley Research Center; Michael Buonanno, deputy chief engineer, QueSST X-Plane, Lockheed Martin; Robert Cowart, director of supersonic technology development, Gulfstream Aerospace; Vik Kachoria, president and CEO, Spike Aerospace; Blake Scholl, founder and CEO, Boom Technology; Gurdip Singh Ubhi, business development executive, Rolls-Royce
by Tom Risen, Aerospace America Staff Reporter (2017-2018)
Advances including aerodynamics, propulsion and composites can make supersonic flight more affordable and open more travel routes than the commercial flights once offered by the British Airways Concorde, a panel of aviation executives said during the 2017 AIAA AVIATION Forum in Denver.
Supersonic flight can “shrink the world” the same way subsonic jet flight did by making it easier for families to visit relatives or vacation or for executives to make business trips, Blake Scholl, founder and CEO of Colorado-based startup Boom Technology, said June 6 in the “Supersonic Transport” panel.
The Concorde had a top speed of Mach 2, or more than 2,000 kph, when it flew commercial flights between 1976 and 2003. The plane was too expensive to fly on limited commercial routes, however, so it “was an economic catastrophe,” Scholl said.
Advances including carbon composites and improved propulsion, however, make it more affordable to build a new generation commercial supersonic jet, Scholl said. In 2018, Boom plans to test the XB-1, a prototype version one-third the size of a supersonic airliner it hopes to debut and certify in the early 2020s.
Supersonic flight, however, creates noise that can not only disturb people and wildlife, but also can have environmental impact — like causing avalanches in mountain ranges, said Vik Kachoria, CEO of Spike Aerospace in Boston.
For this reason, the FAA banned supersonic flights over land even before Concordes began flying over the Atlantic. Reducing the noise of a sonic boom could make it more acceptable for regulators in the U.S. and Europe to allow supersonic flight routes around the world that could take hours off travel time.
To address the noise problem, Spike is developing its S-512 Quiet Supersonic Jet, which aims to cruise with 18 passengers at Mach 1.6 without producing a loud, disturbing sonic boom on the ground, Kachoria said.
This new generation of supersonic commercial travel will be available mainly to the “super rich for now,” Kachoria said, adding there will be a demand for people to travel to London for important business meetings within three or four hours.
“We’ll figure out how to do it better, faster, larger,” he said.
Selling supersonic jets or commercial flights to the wealthy who can afford it “breaches the market; it opens the door,” said Robert Cowart, director of supersonic technology development at Gulfstream Aerospace.