Boom Supersonic’s XB-1 hit Mach 1.1 over Mojave desert, bringing company closer to planned supersonic airliner. A US-made prototype jet has broken the sound barrier, in the first commercial venture to achieve supersonic speeds since Concorde. Boom Supersonic, a startup that seeks to build the world’s fastest airliner, flew a test flight of its fighter jet-sized XB-1 demonstrator over the Mojave desert in California on Tuesday.
At an altitude of about 10,700 metres (35,000ft), the jet accelerated to Mach 1.1, or about 845 mph (1,360 km/h), faster than the speed at which sound travels. “She was real happy supersonic,” Boom’s chief test pilot, Tristan “Geppetto” Brandenburg, said after landing. “That’s the best she’s ever flown.”.
The XB-1 has now completed 12 successful test flights and is a precursor to – and a third of the size of – Boom’s proposed commercial airliner. That aircraft, named, Overture, promises to transport 64-80 passengers across the Atlantic in about 3.5 hours, compared to 6.5 hours by current means.
While its aircraft are still in the test phase, the company has 130 preorders from American Airlines, United Airlines and Japan Airlines. The firm has a factory in North Carolina, where it plans to build 66 Overture aircraft a year. Chuck Yeager became the first human to break the sound barrier in 1947, when he flew the Bell X-1 at Mach 1, also over the Mojave desert.
