By Steve Gorman
PALMDALE, California (Reuters) -NASA’s X-59 supersonic-but-quiet jet airplane soared over the Southern California desert on Tuesday in the first test flight of an experimental aircraft designed to break the sound barrier without all the noise.
The sleek aircraft, measuring just under 100 feet (30 meters) from nose to tail, took off about an hour after sunrise from a runway at Plant 42 of the Lockheed Martin Skunk Works facility in Palmdale, about 60 miles (100 km) north of Los Angeles.
After a steep climb over sod fields just east of the runway, the plane was seen banking to the north on a trajectory toward Edwards Air Force Base, about a dozen miles away, where it was expected to land. It was accompanied by a NASA chase plane.
The single-engine X-59 appeared to fly at subsonic speeds, as was expected for its initial test flight.
A crowd of about 200 aerospace workers and their families watched the takeoff from a safe distance parked along a nearby highway.
A Lockheed Martin spokesperson, Candis Roussel, told Reuters in a brief email statement that the “X-59 successfully completed its first flight this morning” and hailed it as a “significant aviation milestone.” She said the company would provide details later.
The X-59, a one-of-a-kind experimental aircraft, is built to reach a cruising speed of 925 mph (1,490 kph), or Mach 1.4, at an altitude of 55,000 feet (16,764 meters), more than twice as high and roughly 60% faster than typical airliners fly.
The plane’s unique shape is designed to greatly reduce the explosive-like sonic boom normally produced when an aircraft breaks the sound barrier, lowering the volume to a muffled “sonic thump” no louder than slamming a car door.
Perfection of such low-decibel flight technology could make supersonic aircraft more conducive to commercial aviation service, especially over populated areas.
The supersonic Concorde aircraft began scheduled transatlantic flights with British Airways and Air France in 1976. But the plane was retired in 2003 due to high operating costs, limited seating and sluggish passenger numbers following a fatal crash in July 2000 and the September 11 attacks in 2001.
In press materials posted online last month, NASA said the X-59’s first flight would be a “lower-altitude loop at about 240 mph (386 kph) to check system integration, kicking off a phase of flight testing focused on verifying the aircraft’s airworthiness and safety.”
During subsequent test flights, the X-59 will travel higher and faster, eventually exceeding the speed of sound – approximately 761 mph (1,225 kph) at sea level.
The California Manufacturers & Technology Association earlier this month named the X-59 as 2025’s “Coolest Thing Made in California” in its annual statewide technology contest.
(Reporting by David Swanson in Palmdale, California; Writing and additional reporting by Steve Gorman in Los Angeles; Editing by Howard Goller)
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