The US Patent and Trademark Office has recently approved an application from Airbus for a “hypersonic” jet.
The brand new aircraft would reach speeds of Mach 4.5, that is four and a half times the speed of sound. If such machine gets developed, passengers would be able to fly London to New York in about an hour’s time. Such feat would soundly demolish current transatlantic flight times of 7-8 hours on a conventional Airbus A330.
The wonder jet would be powered by three different types of engines that would fire in sequential order to first get the aircraft airborne, then into cruising altitude of 100,000 feet, and finally enable it to reach its cruising speed of over than 3,000 mph.
It remains to be seen whether the design does prove a reality, and whether or not it becomes financially viable for the mass market, a stumbling block that the Concorde fell foul of due to complaints about sonic booms and noise pollution. Because of such issues, Concorde was never able to operate over populated land, thus restricting its potential “mainstream” appeal.