NASA’s X-59 QueSST (Quiet SuperSonic Technology) successfully completed its first flight, signaling a major step in reviving supersonic travel, this time without the disruptive boom. The flight took place just after sunrise over Southern California’s Mojave Desert. Built by Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works, the jet took off from Plant 42 in Palmdale and landed at NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center near Edwards Air Force Base, according to Wired.com.
What makes the X-59 unique: it’s specifically designed to generate a “sonic thump” rather than the loud sonic boom typical of breaking the sound barrier. Its length (~100 ft), long, slender nose, top-mounted engine, and smooth underside help break up and redirect shock waves before they merge and intensify. For instance, the engine sits above the fuselage to reduce under-body disturbance and push sound upward instead of toward the ground.
Commercial supersonic flight over land is currently banned in the United States because of noise concerns. By gathering acoustic and community-response data from test flights, NASA hopes to provide regulators (such as the Federal Aviation Administration) the basis to revise rules and allow faster travel on many more routes. Although the first flight was performed at sub-sonic speed (~240 mph) for validation purposes, the program will advance to high-altitude, supersonic testing (Mach 1.4 at 55,000 ft) in due course.
For aviation engineers and industry watchers, the X-59 is more than an experimental jet; it’s a proof point for a future where travel between distant cities could be dramatically faster without the noise penalties that grounded earlier supersonic efforts.