NASA Just Fired up Its Quiet Supersonic Jet—and It Looks Like Pure Speed | News World

NASA just wrapped engine performance tests on its X-59 research aircraft, which the space agency hopes will prove a means of mitigating supersonic aircraft’s odious sonic booms.

NASA and Lockheed Martin ran the tests between October and February on the single modified F414-GE-100 engine that will power the aircraft and its subsystems.

“We have successfully progressed through our engine ground tests as we planned,” said Raymond Castner, X-59 propulsion lead at NASA’s Glenn Research Center, in an agency release. “We were getting smooth and steady airflow as predicted from wind tunnel testing. We didn’t have any structural or excessive vibration issues. And parts of the engine and aircraft that needed cooling were getting it.”

When planes exceed Mach 1 (the speed of sound, or about 767 miles per hour—1,234 kilometers/hour for…more

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