It’s been more than 20 years since the legendary Concorde last flew, but China could be the one to provide its spiritual successor.
A Beijing-based company called Space Transportation is working on a supersonic jet that’s even faster than NASA’s ‘Son of Concorde’.
In tests, the jet’s engine reached Mach 4 or 3,045mph – four times the speed of sound – at altitudes of more than 65,600 feet, reports South China Morning Post.
This is twice as fast as the defunct Concorde’s max speeds (Mach 2 or 1,338mph) and three times that of NASA‘s ‘Son of Concorde’ (937 miles per hour).
‘This engine has significant commercial potential in the field of high-speed flight within near-space environments,’ Space Transportation said in a statement.
The successful test flight is a key milestone for developing the Yunxing supersonic civilian jet, which will fly passengers from London to New York in under 2 hours.
Space Transportation aims to have the aircraft ready for its first flight by 2027 and the first commercial high-speed point-to-point transport flight to take place by 2030.
Yunxing passengers will be high enough to see the curvature of Earth – where the horizon is a slight curve rather than a straight line, normally seen from 50,000 feet.
Jindouyun, or JinDou400, was named after the ‘somersault cloud’ used by the Monkey King in the classic Chinese novel ‘Journey to the West’.
On Tuesday (December 17) it completed its test flight in northwestern China, reports Global Times, the daily tabloid owned by the Chinese Communist Party.
Jindouyun is a ‘ramjet’ – a type of ‘airbreathing’ jet engine that uses the engine’s forward motion to compress the incoming air.
Ramjet engines burn oxygen directly from the atmosphere, rather than needing to carry their own supply, making them a low-cost, high-power option.
‘This test flight provided key performance data on the engine, validating critical systems including the fuel supply, electrical and control systems,’ the firm said.
‘It also confirmed the engine’s stability and reliability, marking a major milestone in its development from a prototype to a fully functional product.’
Powering the Yunxing aircraft, the Jindouyun engine could usher a new era of superfast passenger travel for commuters and holiday-makers alike.
Promo images suggest Yunxing will be a sleek and futuristic vessel, more like something from Thunderbirds than what we’re used to seeing at airports.
The plane will be made of lightweight, high-strength composite materials, designed to withstand extreme aerodynamic heating while travelling at Mach 4.
Unlike traditional planes that build speed horizontally for takeoff, Yunxing will perform vertical takeoffs and landings, allowing it to ascend and descend in tighter spaces.
This means it won’t have to use conventional runways at today’s airports, potentially operating from smaller, urban airport facilities instead.
Yunxing is now a serious rival for NASA in the race to fly paying passengers aboard a supersonic jet for the first time since Concorde.
After years of anticipation, NASA finally unveiled its supersonic X-59 plane aircraft, unofficially dubbed ‘Son of Concorde’, back in January.
Developed for NASA by Lockheed Martin, the $247.5 million X-59 plane is capable of cruising at 937 miles per hour – faster than the speed of sound but not anywhere near Mach 4.
However, because of its more modest supersonic speeds, X-59 may be a more realistic contender for passenger travel in the near-term compared with other experimental vehicles in development
If cleared for commercial travel, it could be used by flight operators and take passengers from London to New York in under four hours – still slashing today’s travel time in half.
Meanwhile, another American company called Boom Supersonic is working on its own supersonic craft, called Overture, which is eyeing commercial passenger flights in 2029.
Last year, a scaled-down prototype of Overture, called XB-1 Baby Boom, has completed ‘key milestones’ during testing as it progresses towards its first flight.
As for Concorde, the legendary Anglo-French creation had its first commercial flights in 1976, but it was grounded in October 2003 in the aftermath of the catastrophic Air France Flight 4590 crash.
Other reasons for the demise of Concorde were high fuel costs, concern over its noise and a preference for lower fares over speed.
No government or manufacturer has since been able to build a commercial plane that can travel faster than the speed of sound.
THE HISTORY OF CONCORDE
Concorde was a turbojet-powered supersonic passenger jet that was operated from 1976 until 2003.
It had a maximum speed over twice the speed of sound at Mach 2.04 (1,354mph or 2,180k per hour at cruise altitude) and could seat 92 to 128 passengers.
It was first flown in 1969, but needed further tests to establish it as viable as a commercial aircraft. Concorde entered service in 1976.
It is one of only two supersonic transports to have been operated commercially. The other is the Soviet-built Tupolev Tu-144, which ran as a passenger aircraft only for a few years in the 1970s due to safety issues.
Concorde was jointly developed and manufactured by Aérospatiale and the British Aircraft Corporation (BAC) under an Anglo-French treaty. Concorde’s name, meaning harmony or union, reflected the cooperation on the project between the UK and France.
Concorde was retired in 2003 due to a general downturn in the commercial aviation industry after its only crash in 2000, the September 11 attacks in 2001, and a decision by Airbus, the successor to Aérospatiale and BAC, to discontinue maintenance support.
