That’s a far cry from Boom Supersonic’s plans to make high-speed jet travel an everyday luxury.
“Supersonic travel, in my view, is about bringing the world closer together. Our ultimate vision is supersonic flight for every passenger on every route,” Boom Supersonic CEO and founder Blake Scholl told CNN, adding that his company plans to create “the first supersonic airliner that tens of millions of people can fly on.”
That’s a claim about as bold as the aircraft itself. Because even when supersonic passenger jets were criss-crossing the Atlantic, they were all but reserved for royalty, the ultra-wealthy and celebrity travellers. With the Overture, Boom wants to change all that.
Designed to carry up to 80 passengers, Overture is a deeply elegant machine. Or at least, it will be when it hopefully enters service in 2029, as Boom is planning. Overture is being designed and built to fly at up to 18,300m — 50% higher than modern-day wide-body jets — at a top speed of Mach 1.7, a shade more than 2,100km/h. But, with a promised range of just under 8,000km, it’s unlikely we’ll see an Overture making the long journey south from Europe or the US after launch.
But for northern hemisphere destinations not separated by such large distances, it makes perfect sense. Overture could whisk you from Switzerland or Italy to the US in five hours, or from Tokyo to Hawaii in just four.
Holidays at the speed of sound
Boom Supersonic promises to reboot supersonic passenger jet travel that hasn’t been seen for more than 20 years
Image: Supplied
London for lunch. Manhattan for dinner. That’s the promise — and premise — behind Boom Supersonic, which is looking to reboot an age of supersonic passenger jet travel that hasn’t been seen for more than 20 years.
While Russia’s Tupolev Tu-144 also once claimed a brief moment in the high-flying spotlight, if there’s one name synonymous with supersonic travel it is Concorde.
Born of a groundbreaking partnership between Air France and British Airways, from its first scheduled flight in 1976 the name would become a byword for exclusive travel with a sense of high-altitude barrier-breaking luxury. Flying at more than twice the speed of sound — a cool 2,179km/h — it halved the travel time across the Atlantic to just three hours. Those halcyon years lasted until 2003, when a combination of high operating costs, a fatal crash and growing environmental concerns saw the final flights touch down for the last time. And remarkably, despite its fame, only 14 Concordes were ever actually in service.
Air cruises offer high-flying luxury
That’s a far cry from Boom Supersonic’s plans to make high-speed jet travel an everyday luxury.
“Supersonic travel, in my view, is about bringing the world closer together. Our ultimate vision is supersonic flight for every passenger on every route,” Boom Supersonic CEO and founder Blake Scholl told CNN, adding that his company plans to create “the first supersonic airliner that tens of millions of people can fly on.”
That’s a claim about as bold as the aircraft itself. Because even when supersonic passenger jets were criss-crossing the Atlantic, they were all but reserved for royalty, the ultra-wealthy and celebrity travellers. With the Overture, Boom wants to change all that.
Designed to carry up to 80 passengers, Overture is a deeply elegant machine. Or at least, it will be when it hopefully enters service in 2029, as Boom is planning. Overture is being designed and built to fly at up to 18,300m — 50% higher than modern-day wide-body jets — at a top speed of Mach 1.7, a shade more than 2,100km/h. But, with a promised range of just under 8,000km, it’s unlikely we’ll see an Overture making the long journey south from Europe or the US after launch.
But for northern hemisphere destinations not separated by such large distances, it makes perfect sense. Overture could whisk you from Switzerland or Italy to the US in five hours, or from Tokyo to Hawaii in just four.
Image: Supplied
And there’s a reason there are large swathes of the ocean in between those city-pairs. Like Concorde, though Overture may be frighteningly fast when flying, governments put the brakes on where it is allowed to fly. Don’t count on it. Due to the (in)famous sonic boom that happens when a plane breaks the sound barrier, regulations do not allow aircraft to break the sound barrier over land. Though Boom says Overture will still fly faster than conventional jets over land, it’s in transoceanic destinations that Overture will really come into its barrier-breaking own.
There’s an interesting argument in here too for island-bound countries to invest in supersonic connections. Would Mauritius or the Maldives become even more attractive if the journey time was slashed? Quite likely.
But noise pollution isn’t the only concern.
Even in the heady years of the late 20th century, when nobody seemed too worried about carbon emissions, environmental misgivings played a part in Concorde’s demise. Travellers started to question whether the fuel consumption — and resulting environmental impact — of supersonic travel was all that necessary.
Image: Supplied
Boom’s answer to this is ensuring that its Symphony engine — a turbofan purpose-built for supersonic flight — can run entirely on sustainable aviation fuel. That’s a step in the right direction, no doubt, but the question remains: should we be burning fuel, sustainable or otherwise, in excessive quantities just to get where we’re going a little quicker? If you’re a believer in #flygskam, then Overture is the zenith.
But despite those challenges, global airlines seem to be bullish about Overture.
Though it’s years until the first aircraft will take to the skies, Boom Supersonic has 130 firm orders for the Overture on the books. United was the first to put cash on the table, while American Airlines has booked a deposit on up to 20 aircraft, with an option for 40 more. Japan Airlines has also signed up to bring Overture into its fleet.
But don’t pack your bags just yet. The first airline won’t roll out of the custom-built Superfactory in North Carolina — fittingly, the US state where the Wright brothers first took flight — until 2026 at the earliest, and it’ll take a few years after that for the first Overture to roll up to the air bridge at an airport near you. But, for travellers with a love for new experiences, it’s a thrill to imagine that the world of supersonic travel may be taking off again in the not-too-distant future.
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