These 3 Companies Want to Fly You at 4,000 Miles per Hour

Speaker 1: New York to London in 90 minutes, Seattle to Tokyo, less than three hours. That is the promise of hypersonic travel. By now, you've probably heard of the push to bring back super Sonic flight to commercial aviation. That of course has been nothing but a memory since the Concord made its [00:00:30] last commercial flight in 2003 companies like boom, super Sonic, Boeing and Lockheed Martin. Just to name a few are all investing in a future where passengers Corrine through the skies at super Sonic speeds. And even though that future isn't even here yet, some are looking beyond super Sonic. So today let's talk about hypersonic travel, what it is, where it stands today and what it could mean for the future of commercial aviation. Now I'll put time codes [00:01:00] below if you wanna skip a round to different chapters. So what exactly is hypersonic flight it's generally defined as flying at a speed greater than mock five. That's about 3,800 miles per hour or five times. The speed of sound for reference the Concord fluid about mock two, taking it from New York to London in three and a half hours. Now let's look at a little bit of hypersonic history. Speaker 1: Humans have technically been flying at hypersonic speeds since the early sixties, [00:01:30] when we started sending people to space, The first person was a Russian cost during the world's first orbital flight in April, 1961. Later that year, us air force major Robert White flew the X 15 rocket powered aircraft faster than Mo six. Speaker 2: Not Speaker 1: Now the space shuttles, NASA astronauts starting flying in the 1980s went hypersonic every time it [00:02:00] returned to earth, Speaker 3: The 3, 2, 1 launch launch launch Speaker 1: Fast forward to 2004 NASA's experimental space plane, the X 43, a set a new air speed record Speaker 3: Guidance on. We are supersonic Speaker 1: This unmanned plane and its new SCR jet engine hit mock 9.6, close to 7,000 and miles per hour, or put another way about a mile per second. And while NASA and [00:02:30] the military continue to build on existing hypersonic research. The commercial reality feels pretty far off. First of all, there is still a lot that scientists don't understand about the physics of hypersonic travel. And there are a host of challenges we do understand from building an engine that can not only accelerate a vehicle to hypersonic speeds, but maintain that speed efficiently to building the vehicle that can actually withstand the incredible amount of heat that would be generated. And that's not even considering that infamous. [00:03:00] So boom, that happens every time an aircraft breaks the sound barrier. Now we're not gonna get into all of that today. Today, I wanna look at three companies that are taking on the challenge of commercial hypersonic flight and see where they stand right now. Let's start with Herms last month. This Atlanta based company announced it closed 100 million in series B funding This after it revealed the first non-flying prototype of its quarter, horse aircraft last fall, Speaker 4: Hypersonics [00:03:30] needs a unifying vision. That vision should be accelerating. The global human transportation network. Our goal is to complete that challenge to fall five passengers across oceans and hypersonic speeds. Before this young decade is out. Speaker 1: The quarter horse is a remotely piloted demonstrator jet intended to prove the company's tech, maybe most notably it's Chimera engine Speaker 5: 1 0 1 0 3 Speaker 1: [00:04:00] Hermia calls it a turbine based combined cycle engine. Essentially it combines a conventional jet engine with what's known as a Ram jet. That's a special type of engine that uses the aircraft's motion to draw an air for combustion. There's no moving parts. Next up Hermia says it plans to build three flight capable, quarter jets and begin flight testing in 2023. And the company says it does expect the quarter horse to be able to hit mock five. After that Herms moves on to build dark [00:04:30] horse, the company told CNBC dark horse will be capable of sustained hypersonic flight and able to carry cargo or payloads that would be followed by the Halian. The company's hypersonic commercial passenger jet Hermia says it will carry 20 passengers and have a range of 4,600 miles. The company's hoping to have this aircraft in the air for its first test flight in 2029, Next up Venus aerospace operating [00:05:00] out of Houston tech Venus hasn't said quite as much about their hypersonic vehicle. Speaker 1: Here's what we do know the company's catchphrase is home by dinner. The idea there is you could fly from LA to Tokyo for a business meeting and be back to LA in time for dinner, we haven't seen images or renderings of what Venus is. Aircraft will look like, but Venus says we'll see, 12 people fly at mock five on the edge of the atmosphere and be a zero carbon emission vehicle. [00:05:30] The company says they'll use two engines, a jet engine to get the aircraft off the ground and a cruise altitude. Then rocket engines take it to about mock nine in an interview with ch at her news. Venus' CEO said she hopes the aircraft is finished within five years. Then they'd begin the certification process, which could be another five years. So far. Venus has raised 33 million in funding and says it secured government contracts, Chinese startup space. [00:06:00] Transportation showed us its vision with this animated video. It put on the web a few weeks ago. It shows passengers boarding a 12 seater aircraft linked to the belly of a rocket like booster Passenger vehicle separates before pushing [00:06:30] itself to cruising altitude and a process. Similar to how Virgin gala galactic launches its spaceship two Speaker 6: Where Lele release Speaker 7: Fire, fire Speaker 1: Space. Transportation is promising Shanghai in New York. In under two hours. The company is raised about 46 million says that hopes to launch its first test flight in 2025, then a quote complete F full scale global hypersonic vehicle [00:07:00] flight by 2030. Speaker 1: So what we just saw was three very different approaches to hypersonic passenger flight, but all are projecting a similar timeline for when the actual passenger flights be up and running. What about cost? What would it take it on any of these aircraft actually set you back? It's of course, pretty hard to answer given how far we are from any of these being a reality. Herms [00:07:30] has set a one way flight from New York to London would cost around $3,000, but of course, a lot can change in 10 years or more. One thing is certain this technology is coming. It's just a matter of when. So when do you think it'll be here is 20, 30 realistic. Let me know comments below. Can you enjoy this video? Don't forget to give it a thumbs up and to learn more super Sonic flight. [00:08:00] Check out these two videos here. I'll see you in the future.