Supersonic Business Jet Has A Long Waiting List

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed)
Dec 16th 2007 at 8:02AM

We've been hearing about the Aerion supersonic business jet for a while now but it looks like plans for the jet, which can hit Mach 1.6, are moving ahead full steam. The manufacturer has announced that it has letters of intent worth $1.5 billion from customers interested in paying $80 million for the plane. Their first customer is the Pakistan-based Princely Jets.

The supersonic jet can go more than 4000 nautical miles offering eight to 12 passengers a luxurious ride. It can zoom across the Atlantic from New York to Paris in four and a quarter hours. The streamlined design reduces the area of high drag airflow. The cabin will have LCD lights, personal comfort zones and recliner seats with three separate seating areas with a galley and toilet.

The initial deposit for the jet is $250,000. The company estimates that over two decades it could sell more than 500 jets, with about a fifth coming from the fractional business jet market. The jet should be entered into service by 2014.

[via The Australian]

Gallery: Aerion Jet

Tags: aerion, business jet, private jet, supersonic jet

Filed under: Wings

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

John C. Randolph Dec 19th 2007 9:56AM

There's another private SST project underway, which I think would produce a rather more useful result if it succeeds. The "Quiet Supersonic Transport", which is being designed by the Lockheed Skunkworks is supposedly going to be quiet enough to be licensed to fly supersonic over land.

If you check out the flight times link at their web site: http://www.saiqsst.com/

You'll see they expect to turn LA-New York into a 2:15 trip.
If a plane's going to cost $80M, it had better be able to fly fast enough over land to make a serious difference in transit time.

-jcr

John C. Randolph Dec 20th 2007 4:57PM

Oh, one other thing.. Aerion's page on the sonic boom issue is here:

http://www.aerioncorp.com/tech_sonic-boom-compliance.html

and they say they expect to get the overpressure from the shock wave down to 0.8 pounds/square foot. (The Concorde was around 2PSF)

The QSST design is expected to be around .3 PSF, according to their FAQ:

http://www.saiqsst.com/faq.html

-jcr