American Airlines has agreed to purchase 20 supersonic planes from Denver-based Boom Supersonic — if the startup can get the ultrafast jets off the ground and approved by regulators.
Why it matters: Supersonic planes, by definition, travel faster than the speed of sound — 767 miles per hour — but Boom’s in-development Overture jet is expected to travel much faster than that, with a cruising speed of 1,227 mph.
That’s about twice as fast as any existing commercial airplane, so it would dramatically cut flight times — at that speed, a trip from Miami to London would take less than 5 hours, compared to today’s 9.5.
Comments are closed.