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Concorde was fuel-efficient as supersonic aircraft go, but the physics forces weird designs on you and you end up with, well, Concorde. Its cabin was cramped an
by ubernostrum 9y ago
Concorde was fuel-efficient as supersonic aircraft go, but the physics forces weird designs on you and you end up with, well, Concorde. Its cabin was cramped and not particularly comfortable, it cost much more than a regular airliner, and being supersonic didn't save enough time to cover the additional cost and discomfort.
That's why we're still at 0.8-ish mach numbers -- you can build those planes big and comfortable for the people who buy the expensive tickets.
- ghaff 9y agoSupersonic business jets seem plausible and the consensus seems to be that it could be a viable market if they could go supersonic over land. But larger planes seem a real stretch. Really long-haul routes might be getting into the range where people would be willing to sacrifice some seating space/amenities for a much faster plane. But then you're into needing much greater range than the Concorde. And, while there are a few of these routes that are economically viable on today's aircraft, even EWR-SIN didn't ultimately work out for Singapore Airlines.