NASA's X-59 "silent" hypersonic aircraft has completed a year of flight testing and is now on its way across the United States to the Kennedy Space Center. The plane left Edwards Air Force Base on October 28, exactly one year after its first flight, with stops in El Paso, Fort Worth and Birmingham. This aircraft will be shown to the public at the MAX POWER show from November 7th to 8th. Built by Lockheed Martin, the X-59 was designed to fly at Mach 1.4 at 55,000 feet and produce a noise of 75 decibels instead of a sonic boom. The elongated front of the plane distorts sound waves, and the pilot uses a camera-based vision system due to the lack of a windshield. On June 5, 2026, the X-59 aircraft surpassed the speed of sound for the first time, reaching a speed of Mach 1.53 and an altitude of more than 56,000 feet in more than 40 flights. Next, NASA will measure the amount of sound produced at ground level and fly over residential areas to gauge public response and provide data that will help regulators decide whether to lift the ban on commercial supersonic flights in the US, which has been in place since 1973.

NASA's X-59 "silent" hypersonic aircraft has completed a year of flight testing and is now on its way across the United States to the Kennedy Space Center. The plane left Edwards Air Force Base on October 28, exactly one year after its first flight, with stops in El Paso, Fort Worth and Birmingham. This aircraft will be shown to the public at the MAX POWER show from November 7th to 8th. Built by Lockheed Martin, the X-59 was designed to fly at Mach 1.4 at 55,000 feet and produce a noise of 75 decibels instead of a sonic boom. The elongated front of the plane distorts sound waves, and the pilot uses a camera-based vision system due to the lack of a windshield. On June 5, 2026, the X-59 aircraft surpassed the speed of sound for the first time, reaching a speed of Mach 1.53 and an altitude of more than 56,000 feet in more than 40 flights. Next, NASA will measure the amount of sound produced at ground level and fly over residential areas to gauge public response and provide data that will help regulators decide whether to lift the ban on commercial supersonic flights in the US, which has been in place since 1973.