Supersonic airliners will return to the sky

It seems that long after the end of the Concord era, supersonic airliners will return to the sky. The catalog value of one machine is $ 200 million, so the contract price is three billion dollars, said Blake Scholl, founder and head of Boom Technology. The aircraft manufacturer does not provide any discounts. United Airlines plans to be the first operator of the Overture aircraft, which will have a capacity of up to 88 seats. It considers its coastal bases to be a strategic company. He plans a three-and-a-half-hour flight from Newark, New Jersey to London, and a six-hour flight from San Francisco to Tokyo. The boom has so far received $ 250 million from investors to develop the aircraft. The company estimated the cost of the first flight at up to eight billion dollars. United is the first customer to make a financial advance for the Denver-based company. Japan Airlines and Virgin Group of billionaire Richard Branson also placed a pre-order with the manufacturer. The market for new supersonic aircraft could reach $ 160 billion by 2040, UBS Group analyst Myles Walton estimated in December. According to him, speed will be attractive for the corporate and business travel segment. The Overture aircraft reaches a speed of approximately 2,100 kilometers per hour, ie Mach 1.7 (one Mach corresponds to the speed of sound). It will therefore fly about twice as fast as conventional jet airliners. The cruising altitude will exceed 18,000 meters, and will therefore be higher than for other commercial aircraft. At supersonic speeds, the machine will fly, just like before, the concorde only over the ocean. The first Concorde supersonic civil transport aircraft appeared on scheduled flights in early 1976. Before one of the planes crashed near Paris in July 2000, the Concordes were considered to be completely reliable. Their operation was terminated in October 2003, and was hit by, among other things, the post-9/11 air crisis.