Slashdot Mirror
New Supersonic Jet Test Less Than Successful
saberwolf writes "The BBC is reporting in this story that the first test of Japan's supersonic jet didn't go quite as planned when it crashed into the ground seconds after takeoff on its test rig. It looks like a successor to the world's only supersonic passenger jet, Concorde (built jointly by the British and French in the 1960s) is still some way off." Reuters has more pictures.
Please!
Nobody seems to understand that it was the rocket booster that failed, not the test jet. The test jet wouldnt' be activated until something like 18 miles above the ground.
The test jet didn't fail. It was a completely unrelated accident.
-- Daniel
If people were around shooting photos the first time one of my programs were run, the carnage would make this look like child's play. Why would you want to publicize your first tests of anything?!?
What's your damage, Heather?
Used to work at Heathrow in London.
Concorde still draws crowds of admirers, and it still looks the most futuristic passenger plane in "common" commercial use, even 30+ years after it came into service.
What else is there this old that still looks as good......?
I wonder what it sounds like to hear 100 Japanese rocket scientists screaming "Doh!" at the same time...
BBC also has a short RealVideo clip of the crash, replete with one very freaked-out kangaroo fleeing the crash site.
"Luck is the residue of design" --Branch Rickey
it took the European plane decades to achieve this level of carnage.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Did anyone else notice that, if you look closely at the right pictures, this thing took out some sort of building, compound?
You can't see it in the amusing but fairly cruddy BBC Real Video clip but it's fairly clear in this reuters shot, you can clearly see the security fencing.
I guess, in the current climate, they're keen not to emphasis this thing's ability to take out man-made structures.
The BBC article mentions that "Developers, who include Mitsubishi and Nissan, hope that the new supersonic plane will have noise levels similar to the Boeing 747. That would mean that it would be able to operate far more widely than Concorde, which is notoriously noisy." This was also mentioned in previous news stories about the planned aircraft.
Nothing I've seen, however, explains how they were planning to deal with the sonic boom.
Or are they just referring to the noise level when in subsonic operation? In which case, like the Concorde, it could only go supersonic over water... but then how could it "operate far more widely" than the Concorde?
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
In related news, Pentagon officials at a hastily called press conference announced a successful test of the National Missile Defense system. The scheduling of this test was not publicized in advance due to concerns about terrorism. An anonymous DoD source stated that, "Ahhh, that was our test. We finally got it to work. No wait, in fact we have had many successful secret tests. Yeah, that's the ticket!"
You seem to be forgetting the Tupolev TU-144, dubbed Concordski in the west due to its uncanny resemblence to Concorde. Although faster than Corcorde, its crash at the Paris Air Show effectively put an end to its challenge to Concorde in the commercial marketplace. Nonetheless, it was used as a passenger carrying jet in the Soviet Union in 1977 and early 1978 until another crash put and end to its career. Concorde is, therefore, the only currently operating supersonic passenger jet.
"The invisible and the non-existent look very much alike." -- Delos B. McKown
So I agree: flyer beware! Don't expect that a company which is about to launch you into the air in a highly unstable and potentially very dangerous vehicle is going to be honest with you about the risks...
Miko O'Sullivan
While the Slashdot crew is busy arguing whether it was the rocket or the jet that crashed, and who in the world would fly on such a beast, no one is taking into account that this was just a scale model!
The superjet, a 1:10 scale model of a plane that would be able to fly twice as fast as the Concorde, dived into the ground shortly after take-off (Reuters)
Were this a crash of a real jet, yes, it would news. The crash of a model, no.
From my limited observations of the Reuters photos and BBC video clip, it appears that the booster rocket left the pad without the test glider. Immediately after leaving the launch rails, the booster tipped over, indicating that there was an unintentional mass imbalance (hence, gimballed boosters counteracting a non-existent payload) that threw the flight path out of whack. Can anyone tell whether the rocket flopped away from where the payload should have been, or in another direction. If it fell away from the payload, the payload must have become unattached.
If you accept that cars are a good thing (debatable), the purpose of the VW bug was to have a car that most people could afford. Kinda like the Model T but cheaper and better.
Sometimes boldness is in fashion. Sometimes only the brave will be bold.
the north coast of Cornwall (non-UK readers: the 'foot' that sticks out of the UK to the south-west.) You'd often hear the sonic boom from Concorde accelerating through (or decelerating back through) the sound barrier above the Bristol Channel. It sounded like a distant roll of thunder on a hot summer's day. (Of course it was always hot and sunny back then... </nostalgia >&
Nowadays, I live in South London, which happens to be on the flight path for Heathrow (along with most of the rest of south/west London...). The windows are double-glazed, which makes a nice Concorde test: when you can hear aircraft noise indoors, it's *always* either Concorde, or a low-flying police surveillance camera. (We live in a police state over hear, because guns are illegal. Gosh, how I wish I lived in the USA, so I could defend myself against the crushing power of the State! <
The reason the Concorde is so damn loud are the Rolls Royce Olympus engines. They're optimised for supersonic flight, which makes them horribly inefficient -- they have to burn a *lot* of fuel to provide reasonable thrust at low air speeds (and given the airframe's delta-wing profile, "low speed" is relative: I haven't the numbers, but she takes off and lands *very* fast. Most supersonic military aircraft for the last 20 years or so have had variable geometry flight surfaces (BAE Tornado, f'rinstance, or the US Tomcat. Or that fskcing GORGEOUS Russian aircraft with the twin air intakes below the fuselage... but I digress) - the wings are swept forward for low-speed operation, then back into a delta configuration for high speeds.
This is another reason the Concorde's so expensive to run, which was another factor in it's commerical (lack of) success. Now, what I'm wondering - and I'm slightly puzzled why there hasn't been a
Anyone able to enlighten me on this?
"None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free." -- Goethe
I've just seen an Australian news broadcast with interviews of the parties involved and they say that the model separated from the rocket at lift off.
The indication was that the model fell back onto the launch pad and the rocket then went out of control.
And the winner on the day was: Sir Isac Newton!
This test alone cost $7m. They presumably need to build another $80m model to proceed with the other tests, which are probably not penny candy either.
Besides, the video of it crashing is spectacular. That alone makes it newsworthy.
Why is Grand Theft Auto a much more serious crime than Reckless Driving?
The sonic boom does not occur as an aircraft passes through the "sound barrier." The boom is the passage of a shock wave from a supersonic aircraft, and the shock wave exists as long as the aircraft is supersonic. The shock wave can be thought of as the sound trapped in a thing cone because it cannot go faster than the aircraft, so it all "stacks up" in the shock wave.
For example, when the Space Shuttle landed at White Sands, New Mexico, we heard the double boom as it went by Phoenix, AZ. It was still supersonic at the time.
The only good weather is bad weather.
That would be the TU-144, dubbed 'Concordski' due to its amazing resemblance to Concorde. Not coincidental, as they stole early Concorde plans! However the Russians could never get the wing right, so it had to have those ridiculous rabbit ears to avoid stalls at low speed. The Paris Air Show crash which basically did for this plane commercially is believed to have been due to the pilot taking evasive action to avoid a French military jet and overstressing the airframe. Neat site about it here. Good site about Concorde here too.
"Information wants to be paid"
No. The "sonic" (also known as "trans-sonic") flight regime is the one in which there exist both subsonic and supersonic flows on different parts of the airframe. This is well-accepted terminology in aerodynamics. Interestingly, many current commercial jets fly at "sonic" speeds fairly regularly...they're just not awfully efficient at it.
Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
Concorde cruises at 55,000 feet, +/- 5,000. It has to fly that high so that the air density is low enough to reduce friction heating to an acceptable level. Only once it's flying subsonic can it descend to lower levels.