Why were ridiculously fast planes like the SR-71 built, and why hasn’t it speed record been broken for 50 years?
In: Engineering
Its speed record for “how fast can something go” has been broken a bunch of times. The North American X-15 went 4520 mph.
There was even a direct competitor to the SR-71 called the A-12 that went pretty much the same speed, they just look pretty much the same.
The design challenges to make something that flies that fast is where the economics falls apart. The SR71 was extremely expensive, and it was only able to hit those speeds because of the altitude it was flying at. Flying at those speeds at lower altitude would have destroyed the plane At sea level the aircraft was limited to much slower speeds, normally under 1 mach. (500 mph or less)
so basically “How do you go really really fast in a plane?” – go really really high… why don’t we do it anymore? there is no need
btw – the ISS is currently going 4.76 Miles per second… thats over 18k mph. Its just up really really high.
edit: guys – I get it the ISS isn’t a plane, it was just a cool tidbit about shit going really fast
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