In 1972, when I was born, it took 5 hours to fly from LA to New York.
In 2018, it takes... 5 hours.
There's been zero progress on that front. Passenger planes are going the exact speed they did 50+ years ago.
How, with all of the technological advances, have we not improved upon this?
Here's an interesting video about the Concorde, which first flew in 1969, but carried passengers starting 1976. It went double the speed of traditional passenger planes, was able to outpace the earth's rotation, and created sonic booms due to going faster than the speed of sound.
However, in 2003, all Concordes stopped operating permanently.
If you don't feel like watching the video, here's what happened:
- Cost. The Concordes were too costly to buy and maintain, and could only carry 120 passengers. This made ticket prices very expensive, and not accessible to the general public.
- Comfort. The plane was quite narrow, as were the seats.
- Only good for flights over ocean. Complaints about the sonic booms made the impractical for flying over land.
- Safety. The tires were too easily punctured, which caused a crash were 113 died, including four on the ground. This killed the narrative that Concorde was one of the safest passenger planes, and between that and 9//11 (which occurred 14 months later), the writing was on the wall.
Maybe one day faster air travel will return.
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Originally Posted by Tellafriend
