Boeing is serious about commercial hypersonic flights and has its eyes on an aircraft that can fly from New York to London in two hours. The speed of the aircraft will be almost 4,000mph which is nearly five times the speed of sound. It will cruise at altitudes of around 95,000 feet against normal altitudes of 30,000 feet for present day commercial jetliners and could be ready in another two decades.
Daily Mail UK reports that Boeing unveiled the concept at a conference on aviation in Atlanta. The aircraft on the drawing board will bring back the era of supersonic Travel that came to an end when the Concorde went out of service in 2003.
Hypersonic aircraft from Boeing could be a reality
The only supersonic commercial aircraft until today was the Concorde and Boeing wants to gain an entry into the exclusive league of commercial hypersonic flights. Concorde had a top speed of more than 1,300mph but it was withdrawn from service in 2003. The Airbus A380 covers the distance from London to New York in approximately eight hours with a top speed of over 630mph, while most fighter jets can fly at more than 2,500mph.
The speed of sound is 767mph, and any speed greater than that is supersonic.
Engineers at Boeing are trying to evolve the technology that could lead to hypersonic flights of jetliners. Kevin Bowcutt is the hypersonic chief of the company and in his opinion, such technology will help to connect the world faster than ever before. It is difficult to achieve a speed of Mach 5 and Boeing is using its six decades of experience to arrive at a solution.
Boeing’s dream aircraft could fly by 2030
According to Independent UK, such an aircraft will drastically cut down the travel time between New York and London and reduce it to just two hours by the Atlantic route. It would also reduce the Pacific route to around three hours.
The jetliner would be flying at a speed of around 3800mph which is nearly five times the speed of sound. That will break the record of two hours and 52 minutes for a transatlantic crossing by a commercial jet. Concorde previously held the record for it.
“When you look at the problem of getting from point A to point B anywhere in the world, the question is how fast do you want to go and how fast is fast enough?” Kevin Bowcutt said to Aviation Week.
Boeing is continuously carrying out research into various aspects of aviation and also is engaged in activities related to space research. The company has already intensified its research in the field of hypersonic flight and expects to have the jetliner in service tentatively by the late 2030s.