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Towards Silent Supersonic Planes

Posted by timothy on from the wish-they'd-work-more-on-trains dept.

Roland Piquepaille writes "There is no longer a single commercial supersonic airplane since the retirement of the Concorde last year. And even during its years of glory, the Concorde was not a commercial success, mainly because it was not allowed to cruise at supersonic speed over land. Why? Because of the sonic 'boom' which arises when you break the sound barrier. Now, a joint program between NASA, the military and the aerospace industry wants to remove, or at least reduce, this sonic boom, by changing the shape of supersonic planes. It seems to work. After a 'nose job' on a Northrop Grumman F-5E, about a third of the pressure released when breaking the sound barrier has already been suppressed. This overview contains more details. It also includes a photograph of the modified Northrop Grumman F-5Ea aircraft flying off the wing of the F-15B research testbed aircraft. [Note: Previous results were reported here by Slashdot in last September.]"

9 of 332 comments (clear)

  1. That third plane is weird by McCrapDeluxe · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    It has an American logo and a red star. Have the commies taken over?

    1. Re:That third plane is weird by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      Actually, the commies *have* taken over, at least in the Bush white house. GWB, his daddy, Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon were *ALL* Chinese agents. If you don't think so, take a look at what they've done (and are still doing) for China at the expense of the citizens of the US.

      GWB however, has surpassed his predecessors. He is also an agent of Israel and international opium traffickers.

      Since being appointed president, GWB has set an exceptionally large number of records for horrifyingly poor performance or policies. It may be that one of his records will include "First US President shot for treason".

  2. Misreading by bezuwork's+friend · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Having been reading /. for some years, I misread the heading as

    Torvalds Silent Supersonic Planes

    ... While I knew this wasn't right, a parallel thought existed for a second: "damn! where did he get the time to design a plane?"

  3. Re:Blah blah blah words words words by Ravenrage · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    stfu some of us like to hear about these things slashdot exists so that we can read these things. after all if they did not post these types of stories then all the stories would be about sco and the like...how boring.

  4. Re:fuck all jews by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    I've never had the honor of pleasuring a semitic princess, you insensitive clod!

  5. Re:Now by Micah · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    And the neighbor's @%$#@% barking and squealing dogs that wake me up a couple hours before I want to get up?

    Please???

  6. Re:Frost Pist!!!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    You fail the following:
    it

    EOF

  7. Hey genius. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    If you don't like my comments, put a plastic bag over your head and DIE!!!!

  8. Re:Looking at the picture by BCW2 · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Every now and then we all step on our dicks, I was just wearing golf shoes this time.

    --
    Professional Politicians are not the solution, they ARE the problem.