The Next Concorde ?

If you think the skies have gotten a bit slow since the Concorde was retired there may be good news on the horizon, the far distant horizon. Aero-News Network reports on a Japanese project, the “next-generation” SST, designed to fly at over than Mach 2. It’s sponsored by the Japanese Space Agency but the same people behind the Airbus are involved. The new plane will be tested over the Australian Outback as soon as next month. The project has been around for a while, an earlier prototype crashed in the desert. There are also still the hurdles of high fuel consumption and noise levels to be surmounted. Don’t go planning your flight anytime soon, if all goes well the new 300-passenger Concorde replacement will be ready for general flight in 2020.