Supersonic Private Jet

A new generation of supersonic private jets could trigger a boom in luxury high-speed flight -without the sonic boom normally associated with breaking the sound barrier.

Aerion Supersonic Business Jet, the first private plane that will fly at 1.6 Mach. The first unit has just been purchased by Sheikh Rashid, the ruler of Dubai. This bird will be able to fly the Ellisons, Jobs and Gores of this world from Paris to New York in just over 4 hours, so even while it has a $80,000,000 price tag, there will be no demand problems for it. $80 million is still cheap by comparison to the first generation of Concorde jets, which cost $46 million in 1977 (nearly $150 million in 2005 dollars when adjusted for inflation). Aerion has signed a Zurich, Switzerland-based company, ExecuJet, as its international sales agent. ExecuJet is offering 40 early-delivery positions for the Aerion jet to potential customers, orders will be secured by $250,000 refundable deposits.

The Aerion Supersonic Business Jet will be able to cruise at 1.15 Mach over land without producing any boom on the ground. The plane can also keep a 0.98 Mach speed offering a similar cost-per-mile than competing subsonic private jets and complying with US regulations. Over water, however, you will be free to speed it up and sustain 1.5 Mach with ease. To give you an idea, at this speed the Aerion can cross the Atlantic in two hours.

But Aerion is not the only group scrambling to create a superfast executive.

Skunk Works unit is designing a small, 12-seat passenger jet that would travel at 1,200 mph (Mach 1.8) but which would produce only a whisper of the annoying crack once emitted by the retired Concorde.
Aimed at business executives and diplomats, the QSST (for “quiet supersonic travel”) will fly at nearly twice the speed of conventional business jets and have a range of 4,600 miles nonstop — Los Angeles to New York in just over two hours.
It could be ready for boarding by 2013, according to the company.
Designers expect the QSST to make a sonic boom less than a hundredth that of the Concorde’s aural impact. Concorde was barred from flying at supersonic speeds over the United States when it debuted in the 1970s because excessive noise was produced by pressure waves colliding in the plane’s wake.

Even if airplanes works as hoped, there is no guarantee that aviation authorities will let it fly through civilian airspace at supersonic speeds. At just under the speed of sound - Mach 0.99 - travelling from New York to Los Angeles would take around four hours.

Source gizmodo wired technology.newscientist

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