NASA's Mach 4 Passenger Jet: London to New York in 90 Minutes
NASA has revealed its "high-speed strategy" to study the feasibility of commercial flights at speeds of up to Mach 4 (over 3,000 miles per hour), potentially reducing travel time between New York and London to just 90 minutes. The agency is developing "quiet" supersonic aircraft called X-59s as part of its Quesst mission, with hopes of eventually modifying rules that currently ban overland supersonic flight. Two teams, led by Boeing and Northrop Grumman Aeronautics Systems, will work on designing aircraft capable of sustaining high-supersonic speeds. The next research phase will consider safety, efficiency, economic, and societal factors, with the aim of having enough data to hand over to US regulators by 2027.