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Boom supersonic jet readies for rollout

airlineratings.com

131–140 of 283 posts

Re: Boom supersonic jet readies for rollout

#131
post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the real problem is that the Concorde wasn't fast enough to justify the cost. Whether you can fly JFK-CDG in 8 hours or 4 hours, when you factor in how irritating airports are, parking, security line ups, waiting for baggage, etc, it still takes all day to make the trip. Might as well save several thousand dollars and take a longer flight. I believe they would have to cut the flight time down to about an hour…

> Whether you can fly JFK-CDG in 8 hours or 4 hours, when you factor in how irritating airports are, parking, security line ups, waiting for baggage, etc, it still takes all day to make the trip. Security lines weren't a thing until 2001. The Concorde operated from 1976 to 2003. The retirement was due to low passenger count due to a crash in 2000 and 9/11 in 2001.

I remember going through security for domestic U.S. flights in the 1990s. They had magnetometers and I think they had some kind of baggage x-ray machine. It was faster because they didn't check IDs, and I don't think they were that careful about having people go through the metal detector one at a time with a security agent actively watching them pass through.

Re: Boom supersonic jet readies for rollout

#132
post #116

> The timeline for the planned entry into airline service has now also slipped from the previously envisaged 2023-24 to between 2025 and 2027. A jet which has not even been flown once might enter airline service in 5-7 years? The whole article is a PR insert.

> A jet which has not even been flown once might enter airline service in 5-7 years?

Considering that flight testing will begin soon, it doesn't seem that unrealistic. Have you got some actual evidence to the contrary?

> The whole article is a PR insert.

Yes, clearly, but that doesn't seem related to your first point.

Re: Boom supersonic jet readies for rollout

#133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not the issue. It's the third supersonic airliner, not the second; the Soviet Union had the Tu-144.

I think anybody would be hard-pressed to argue that the Tu-144 saw meaningful commercial passenger service. Neither has Boom yet, to be fair, but it at least isn’t provably a failure at this point.

True, but it was a supersonic airliner, 16 pieces were built and it did have 55 passenger-carrying flights (according to Wikipedia), so if you make a list without further qualifiers as in the article ("second ever"), it's a bit strange to gloss over it completely...

Re: Boom supersonic jet readies for rollout

#134
post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, much more excited if there were talk of high-speed rail criss-crossing the U.S.

High-speed rail isn't high speed enough. Even with way faster than current tech and NO stops you'd still be looking at taking 12+ hours for what a plane can do in 5. That's ignoring the trillions it would cost. The US does not have the population density to make HSR viable.

You say like it is a bad thing but I'll take 12 hours in a nice stable train over 7 hours spent in going in and out of airports and sitting on economy airliner seats.

I would actually pay a premium. This actually is reality today. Acela on the Northeast corridor is more expensive than comparable air fares and it's not even that good.

Re: Boom supersonic jet readies for rollout

#135
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or maybe the military has technology we don't know about yet?

I'm not so sure. Airplanes are hard to keep secret when they're flying around, and existing planes have their capabilities pretty well figured out by now. It's not every day a new airframe is built. I'd expect the $100MM USD F-35 to have all the latest tech, being the newest fighter available.

Airplanes, yes, UFOs, no, you want people to post grainy pictures of those :)

Re: Boom supersonic jet readies for rollout

#136
post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the real problem is that the Concorde wasn't fast enough to justify the cost. Whether you can fly JFK-CDG in 8 hours or 4 hours, when you factor in how irritating airports are, parking, security line ups, waiting for baggage, etc, it still takes all day to make the trip. Might as well save several thousand dollars and take a longer flight. I believe they would have to cut the flight time down to about an hour…

The concorde didn't fail because it was expensive. It ran profitably for 27 years. [0] It failed because it crashed and killed 109 people 3 years before they threw in the towel. [1] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concorde#Operating_economics [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_France_Flight_4590

On top of that, none of the things mentioned were big problems during the 80s when the concord was in its peak. Security just started ramping up after the wave of 1970s hijackings that necessitated security at airports

Re: Boom supersonic jet readies for rollout

#139
post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the real problem is that the Concorde wasn't fast enough to justify the cost. Whether you can fly JFK-CDG in 8 hours or 4 hours, when you factor in how irritating airports are, parking, security line ups, waiting for baggage, etc, it still takes all day to make the trip. Might as well save several thousand dollars and take a longer flight. I believe they would have to cut the flight time down to about an hour…

The concorde didn't fail because it was expensive. It ran profitably for 27 years. [0] It failed because it crashed and killed 109 people 3 years before they threw in the towel. [1] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concorde#Operating_economics [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_France_Flight_4590

The main reason the airlines managed to run Concorde at a profit is because they bought the planes for quite cheap. At one point the British government even sold two planes to British airways for £1 each. [0]

The airlines might have profited, but the R&D and manufacturing programs were a more or less write offs.

[1] https://simpleflying.com/british-airways-1-pound-concorde/

Re: Boom supersonic jet readies for rollout

#140
post #116

> The timeline for the planned entry into airline service has now also slipped from the previously envisaged 2023-24 to between 2025 and 2027. A jet which has not even been flown once might enter airline service in 5-7 years? The whole article is a PR insert.

> A jet which has not even been flown once might enter airline service in 5-7 years? Considering that flight testing will begin soon, it doesn't seem that unrealistic. Have you got some actual evidence to the contrary? > The whole article is a PR insert. Yes, clearly, but that doesn't seem related to your first point.

Flight testing of a one third scale prototype will likely begin next year. Given they haven't even started manufacturing the full scale prototype it seems unlikely that they can get into service in 7 years. To give a recent example the A400M took 7 years from the start of the prototype build in 2007 to entering service in 2014.
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