Future boeing projects

For sale after 2007, Boeing planned to build a new 700- mile-per-hour Sonic Cruiser, which will reduce the current seven-hour transatlantic airline journey by one hour. Boeing also planned to increase aircraft speeds significantly with an entirely new engine technology using a mixture of conventional jet fuel—derived from oil, a fossil fuel— with clean-burning hydrogen. Prior to Boeing’s new tests, the top speeds of commercial aircraft had been stagnant since 1970, when the record for the fastest civilian aircraft (1,600 miles per hour) was set by a Russian Tupolev Tu- 144. Typical jet aircraft speeds (500 miles per hour) had not changed since the 1950’s.

In 2001, Boeing unveiled a prototype superfast aircraft that could fly passengers between London and New York in forty minutes. In May, the Hyper-X, “a flying engine that looks like a surfboard with fins,” designed jointly by Boeing and NASA, was tested over the Pacific Ocean 75 miles off Los Angeles.

In the engine test, the Hyper-X was bolted beneath the wing of a B-52 bomber. The B-52 released the “flying surfboard” at 20,000 feet, as a conventional booster rocket drove it to about 2,000 miles per hour. Revolutionary scramjets then cut in and, for ten seconds, the hypersonic plane reached a maximum speed of 5,000 miles per hour, making it the fastest aircraft in history.

Ordinary jet engines are propelled by blades that drag air into a chamber, compress it, mix it with jet fuel, and explode it out of the rear to create forward momentum.

Scramjets have no blades, but depend on previously generated speeds to force air through an oval-shaped mouth into a copper chamber, where it mixes with hydrogen to produce a much more powerful explosion.

The Hyper-X can fly at speeds of up to 5,000 miles per hour, more than three times as fast as the next-fastest airliner, the thirty-year-old Concorde, which had become technologically obsolete by the year 2000. Other tests were foreseen with prototypes able to fly as fast as 7,000 miles per hour. Such vehicles could circumnavigate the earth in fewer than four hours. Boeing intended initially to design such aircraft for the U.S. military and then to build a bigger version for cargo operators. After all tests were completed, Boeing would build a version for commercial customers, such as British Airways, starting in 2016.

Boeing’s hypersonic aircraft would be much smaller than the jumbojets that comprised parts of many airline fleets during the late twentieth century. The bigger planes lack the structural integrity required to withstand vastly accelerated speeds. The development of hypersonic aircraft also has been made possible by advances in the strength of manufactured metals. For structural reasons, the new airliner probably will have no windows. Passengers will be protected from a gravitational force of 6 g’s by a highly pressurized cabin. The aircraft also will accelerate and decelerate slowly to lessen the effects of changing gravity. Such aircraft also will produce sonic booms as they accelerate, so routes will need to be configured to avoid large population areas at the point of transition to hypersonic flight.

Pilot/Controller Glossary

Even pilots native to English-speaking countries may have widely diverging accents, and syntax differs from region to region in many countries. In the United States, after 1972 the FAA established a pilot/controller glossary in the AIM that put forth words and phrases that were largely compatible with those of the ICAO. These words had developed by trial and error since the 1930’s, and the FAA found them both efficient and effective. Common words include “Affirmative” to answer a question “yes,” while “negative” answers such a question with “no.” Flight students soon learn that on the radio, monosyllabic words such as “yes” or “no” might not transmit over the radio. Within the United States alone, different regions say “yes” in fashions confusing to the inhabitants of other localities. A commonly misused aviation word, “Roger,” means simply that the hearer has received all of the last transmission. It does not indicate compliance with an instruction, nor understanding of information. When pilots or controllers do not understand a transmission, they should ask the sender to “Say again.” AIM Phonetic Alphabet

Letter Word Pronunciation

A Alpha al-fah

B Bravo brah-voh

C Charlie char-lee or shar-lee

D Delta dell-tah

E Echo eck-oh

F Foxtrot foks-trot

G Golf golf

H Hotel hoh-tel

I India in-dee-ah

J Juliet jew-lee-ett

K Kilo key-loh

L Lima lee-mah

M Mike mike

N November no-vem-ber

O Oscar oss-cah

P Papa pah-pah

Q Quebec key-beck

R Romeo row-me-oh

S Sierra see-air-rah

T Tango tang-go

U Uniform you-nee-form or oo-nee-form

V Victor vik-tah

W Whiskey wiss-key

X X ray ecks-ray

Y Yankee yang-key

Z Zulu zoo-loo

Not all pilots agree with the principle of standard phraseology. To teach standard phraseology takes time, and its benefits are not readily apparent with each use. Articles in aviation magazines occasionally have derided established phraseology, some authors belittling aviators who used it or instructors who taught it. Many of these too quickly embraced the AIM’s allowance that, should a pilot’s understanding of phraseology fail, he might simply speak conversational English. Others retorted that every pilot’s public duty is to learn the system and be a fully functioning part of that system, which includes established communications standards.

Within the aviation community, as in most others, effective communication remains elusive. Yet while other industries tend to have codes or jargon for internal use, the decades have forged aviation’s communications system into an English-based specialty language. As such, aviation- speak is inefficient for face-to-face conversation but very succinct for time-critical communications in a fluid environment. That fact and its implications are only just beginning to make inroads into the flight training environment.

Flight schools still concentrate on teaching aerodynamics, airplane systems, maneuvers, regulations, weather, or myriad other subjects that at the time seem far more immediate than communications. Overall, the aviation industry continues to awaken to communications as a serious public safety issue.

Air shows are events featuring the exhibition of aircraft and the demonstration of aviation skills. Early air shows helped to promote aviation and increase public awareness about the excitement of flying. Air shows continue to display the latest in aviation techniques and development.

The first airplanes had more value as curiosity pieces than as means of transportation. For ten years after the Wright brothers’ flight of 1903, aviation was kept alive by devotees who toured the country while performing at circuses, fairs, and anywhere else people would pay to see them. These daredevils performed aerobatic feats, walked on airplane wings, made parachute jumps, and took paying customers for joyrides. Many of these pioneer pilots died in pursuit of their aerial adventures, but they lent an air of romance and danger to the new field of aviation.

World War I-era pilots often had little or no training, flying instead by instinct and sheer courage. During the war, these daring pilots flew into combat zones with courage and determination.

After World War I, the U.S. government offered thousands of surplus airplanes, most of them Curtiss Jennys, for sale at bargain prices. Although these airplanes were stronger than those that had been built before the war, they were not always safe. Made mostly of wood and cloth, they also lacked satisfactory navigational equipment. However, many former military pilots bought these airplanes and used them for an exciting and dangerous type of flying called barnstorming.

Barnstormers toured the United States in the 1920’s and put on daring air shows at county fairs and other events. Audiences were thrilled to watch. The pilots flew the airplanes in wild aerobatics and daring stunts. Performers, called wing-walkers, stepped from wingtip to wingtip in midair or leaped from the wing of one flying airplane to another. There were many accidents, some fatal.

Highly skilled World War II pilots were used to faster, more technically advanced airplanes than those of World War I. Although World War I dogfights had spurred aviators to postwar displays of courage and craziness with aerobatics, barnstorming, and cow-pasture thrill shows, post- World War II pilots had more venues in which to display their skills, including air races, air shows, carnivals of the sky, and precision flying. The air shows of the 1940’s and 1950’s were also showcases for new and sometimes customized aircraft. Parachuting and mock dogfights remained popular parts of air show activities.