PartagerLondon to Sydney in 5 hours?
Reaction Engines Ltd. of Oxfordshire, England, is one of the companies working on flights of the future. Its concept A2 airplane is to combine extremely advanced liquid-hydrogen technology with environmental friendliness.
Commercial flights will change drastically in the decades to come.
Reaction Engines Ltd. of Oxfordshire, England, is one of the companies working on flights of the future. Its concept A2 airplane is to combine extremely advanced liquid-hydrogen technology with environmental friendliness. If launched, it will fly 300 passengers up to 20 000 km at speeds of up to Mach 5, producing only water as a by-product. Future flyers will be able to travel from London to Sydney in about 5 hours (compared with around 24 hours today). Reaction Engines believes the A2 is technically feasible and could be a reality within 25 years.
The A2 has two major selling points for success in the commercial market:
. the plane would be affordable: a ticket would cost about as much as typical airfare;
. though the A2 would be over 140 m long, much larger than a Boeing 747, it would weigh less than a typical jet airliner and still be able to land at most existing airports.
There is one thing that passengers will have to get used to: no windows. It is not technologically feasible to put airline windows in a plane that travels at Mach 5.
Reaction Engines Ltd. of Oxfordshire, England, is one of the companies working on flights of the future. Its concept A2 airplane is to combine extremely advanced liquid-hydrogen technology with environmental friendliness. If launched, it will fly 300 passengers up to 20 000 km at speeds of up to Mach 5, producing only water as a by-product. Future flyers will be able to travel from London to Sydney in about 5 hours (compared with around 24 hours today). Reaction Engines believes the A2 is technically feasible and could be a reality within 25 years.
The A2 has two major selling points for success in the commercial market:
. the plane would be affordable: a ticket would cost about as much as typical airfare;
. though the A2 would be over 140 m long, much larger than a Boeing 747, it would weigh less than a typical jet airliner and still be able to land at most existing airports.
There is one thing that passengers will have to get used to: no windows. It is not technologically feasible to put airline windows in a plane that travels at Mach 5.