Regulations should accommodate both what supersonic aircraft technology can reasonably deliver and what airport communities will tolerate.These are topics we are currently preparing bids for. For example, a study conducted for Aerion indicated potential sales of 30 supersonic aircraft a year for 20 years in the small business market. Second, for many years after their initial reintroduction, the number of supersonic aircraft departing any airport will be a small fraction of all traffic. First, as mentioned earlier, the Concorde provides a precedent for making a special case for supersonic aircraft. In addition, I believe the current airport-noise rules, requiring supersonic aircraft be no louder than subsonic airplanes, impose an unreasonable burden on supersonic aircraft developers. Rather than banning booms entirely, it would be better to set maximum boom levels, to balance the benefits of supersonic flight with noise. And, the NASA X-59 project may result in supersonic aircraft with much weaker booms. Aircraft flying at low supersonic speeds do not generate a significant boom. In my view, the current ban on any flight over land at supersonic speed is too restrictive. An important first step involves the FAA simplifying the process for testing supersonic aircraft. administration signalled that it wants to amend the rules to facilitate supersonic commercial flight. In its Reauthorization Act of 2018, the FAA is required to review the regulations for supersonic aircraft on sonic boom and airport noise. Technology and market forces are making supersonic aircraft more acceptable and more affordable but the relevant aviation rules haven’t changed since the Concorde era. Essentially, in the design of supersonic planes, a compromise has to be found between noise and efficiency. That, in turn, requires more fuel to be carried aboard the plane and burned in flight, which is both heavy and expensive. That’s because supersonic aircraft can’t use the big new engines, which greatly increase the drag at high speed. Those standards are now much harder for supersonic aircraft to meet. The new engines are so quiet that regulators have twice been able to decrease the amount of noise airplanes are allowed to make since Concorde stopped flying. These engines also greatly reduce airport noise by accelerating a larger volume of air to a lower velocity than smaller engines. The latest subsonic aircraft use very large jet engines that deliver high fuel efficiency. The Concorde was so loud, however, that it had to be given an exception from those rules. by the FAA, and the current rules require that supersonic aircraft meet the same airport noise standards as subsonic aircraft. Airport noise is also regulated in the U.S. Nowadays, I recognize that landing and takeoff noise at airports is a second barrier to supersonic aircraft. My father took me to see the Concorde take off in the early 1970s, and what I remember after all these years is the noise. With flight demonstrations scheduled to begin in 2021, success in NASA’s project could remove one important barrier to supersonic flight. By careful shaping of the aircraft, the goal is to weaken the shock waves or to prevent them from reaching the ground. However, NASA is working to significantly reduce the sonic boom in its X-59 program. To protect the public from sonic booms, the current FAA regulations ban the flight over land of any commercial aircraft at supersonic speed. by the Federal Aviation Administration - and by Transport Canada in Canada. This is the sonic boom, which is experienced as a startling thud.Ĭommercial flights are regulated in the U.S. When a supersonic aircraft flies overhead, some of the shock waves may reach the ground. Shock wave patterns around supersonic aircraft were recently imaged in NASA experiments. When the aircraft itself is flying faster than sound, the disturbances are compressed together into a stronger disturbance called a shock wave. Westcoast Homes & Design Previous IssuesĪs an aircraft flies through the air, it creates pressure disturbance waves that travel at the speed of sound.Vancouver Sun Run: Sign up & event info.
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