Quesst:
The Aircraft
NASA’s first purpose-built, supersonic X-plane in decades will soon take to the skies. A single pilot is to fly the 99.7-foot-long, 29.5-foot-wide aircraft powered by a single jet engine. Its design research speed will be Mach 1.4, or 925 mph, flying at 55,000 feet. NASA will use the experimental X-59 to provide data that will help establish acceptable noise thresholds for supersonic flight over land by proving a sonic boom can be reduced to a barely-audible sonic thump heard on the ground.
Specifications on the X-59 Research Aircraft
This “four-view” of the X-59 research aircraft provides specifications of the piloted vehicle that is being built by Lockheed Martin Skunk Works. The X-59 is an experimental aircraft only; it is not a prototype design for a commercial airliner and will never carry passengers. Its unique shape and set of technologies reduce the loudness of a sonic boom reaching the ground to that of a gentle thump. It will be flown above select U.S. communities to collect data from residents responding to the X-59’s sonic thump.
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Quesst: The Aircraft News
Stay up-to-date with the latest content from the Quesst mission on the X-59 aircraft.
Researchers from NASA and the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) recently tested a scale model of the X-59 experimental aircraft…
High over the Mojave Desert, two NASA F-15 research jets made a series of flights throughout May to validate tools…
NASA’s X-59 quiet supersonic research aircraft successfully completed a critical series of tests in which the airplane was put through…
Lee esta historia en español aquí. NASA’s quiet supersonic X-59 research aircraft has cleared electromagnetic testing, confirming its systems will work…
NASA completed the first maximum afterburner engine run test on its X-59 quiet supersonic research aircraft on Dec. 12. The…
Lee esta historia en español aquí. NASA’s Quesst mission marked a major milestone with the start of tests on the…
Some Assembly Required: An X-59 Image Gallery
How NASA’s X-59 May Change the Future of High-Speed Flight
NASA’s X-59 quiet supersonic research aircraft is the culmination of decades of aeronautics and supersonic flight research. The X-59 is designed to be able to fly supersonic, or faster than the speed of sound, without producing a loud sonic boom. Instead, the X-59 is designed to reduce that boom to a quieter sonic “thump.” The X-59 is the centerpiece of NASA’s Quesst mission, which seeks to survey the public’s response to quieter supersonic flight and provide data to regulators to establish acceptable noise thresholds for commercial supersonic flight over land, opening the future to reduced flight times around the country and the world.
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