Lockheed Martin completes first flight of X-59 supersonic test plane
My heart be still: Lockheed Martin yesterday completed the first flight for NASA of the X-59 supersonic test plane, designed to produce a much quieter sonic boom.
The X-59 took off from Skunk Works’ facility at U.S. Air Force Plant 42 in Palmdale, California, before landing near NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center in Edwards, California. The X-59 performed exactly as planned, verifying initial flying qualities and air data performance on the way to a safe landing at its new home.
The plane did NOT yet fly at supersonic speeds. It needs to do more flight tests before it attempts that feat. A somewhat uninteresting video of the flight can be seen here. (Hat tip to Jay.)
This NASA program is another example of government waste. NASA issued the company a $247.5 million the contract for this test plane in 2018, after two years of preliminary design work. Seven years later it finally flies once, but not at supersonic speeds.
Meanwhile, the commercial startup Boom Supersonic started at about the same time, raised far less investment capital, and successfully flew a supersonic flight in January 2025 in which it broke that sound barrier three times, with no audible sonic boom.
Boom has already obtained numerous contracts with the airline companies United and Japan Airlines to provide them planes. It is in the process of manufacturing its Overture commercial passenger jet for sale.
Lockheed Martin’s NASA project has no investors and no airlines interested in the test plane. Lockheed Martin itself is not marketing it and has no plans to use the technology commercially. In fact, NASA likely forbids it from doing so.
I am sure these tests will provide data helpful to Boom and the handful of other commercial supersonic startups. At the same time, the entire project is another example of a poor use of taxpayer funds.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
My heart be still: Lockheed Martin yesterday completed the first flight for NASA of the X-59 supersonic test plane, designed to produce a much quieter sonic boom.
The X-59 took off from Skunk Works’ facility at U.S. Air Force Plant 42 in Palmdale, California, before landing near NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center in Edwards, California. The X-59 performed exactly as planned, verifying initial flying qualities and air data performance on the way to a safe landing at its new home.
The plane did NOT yet fly at supersonic speeds. It needs to do more flight tests before it attempts that feat. A somewhat uninteresting video of the flight can be seen here. (Hat tip to Jay.)
This NASA program is another example of government waste. NASA issued the company a $247.5 million the contract for this test plane in 2018, after two years of preliminary design work. Seven years later it finally flies once, but not at supersonic speeds.
Meanwhile, the commercial startup Boom Supersonic started at about the same time, raised far less investment capital, and successfully flew a supersonic flight in January 2025 in which it broke that sound barrier three times, with no audible sonic boom.
Boom has already obtained numerous contracts with the airline companies United and Japan Airlines to provide them planes. It is in the process of manufacturing its Overture commercial passenger jet for sale.
Lockheed Martin’s NASA project has no investors and no airlines interested in the test plane. Lockheed Martin itself is not marketing it and has no plans to use the technology commercially. In fact, NASA likely forbids it from doing so.
I am sure these tests will provide data helpful to Boom and the handful of other commercial supersonic startups. At the same time, the entire project is another example of a poor use of taxpayer funds.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Flight research as government waste…sure.
For years, all I ever heard was how NASA needed to be like NACA.
This is most certainly a NACA type deal –and Mr. Z still isn’t happy that more engineers aren’t under viaducts with baseheads
I have mixed feelings over the article comment about the X-59 being a waste of money versus Boom doing it privately. I applaud Boom for their work but all of the data from their research is proprietary. Any design resulting from Boom’s research may be patented and the situation could end up like early aviation where the Wright Brothers tried to claim their patents covered most other heavier-than-air aircraft. The data from the X-59 program will be public data that others can use for development which is a boon to the overall aircraft industry.
BillB: Your point is well taken. My cynicism here is based on almost a half century of similar work by NASA, spending lots of money for test spacecraft like this that all have ended up as dead end projects, producing nothing in the commercial market.
Boom’s work might be proprietary, but that is exactly what gives the company value, and thus attracts investor capital.
Jeff Wright,
You wrote: “This is most certainly a NACA type deal”
When was the last time that the NACA spent seven years on a test plane before its first flight? How many times did it spend that much time on a test plane? Was this kind of lackadaisical engineering typical of NACA or did NACA get things done in a more timely fashion?
I have a suspicion that we made so much progress in aviation before NACA was turned into NASA because the former worked much faster than the current NASA does.
It has only been in recent decades, ever since the marxist-style welfare state invaded the U.S., with LBJ’s Great Society, that government projects slowed to a crawl, including far too many of NASA’s projects. The U.S. government has become a marxist welfare state, even where engineering is concerned. NACA was not a welfare program but facilitated engineering research that kept America on the forefront of aviation for its entire existence.
BillB. Like the days of the Wright Brothers, and that is a negative? I am sure I could buy some data from Boom, yes NDA and agreement on any patents I might file for inventions inspired by that data. Not disagreeing with the fact that with the Brothers, Edison (think movie industry) and Bell and many others, those times had bare knuckle fights over IP. Marconi, etc. Wow, think of it. How wonderful it was before all this anti-risk public ownership. How many tax dollars went into funding those 4 papers Einstein wrote in 1904.
Whether or not it turns out to be a waste of money, the X-59 program has been glacially slow. The glory days of the 40s and 50s when a new X-craft seemed to pop up every few months are gone and, seemingly, never coming back.
My main concern about the X-59, anent the possibility of later commercial exploitation, is that its shape seems decidedly suboptimal for an airliner. Thus, the aerodynamics underlying its quieter boom may not translate well, or even at all, into commercial service applications. I have serious doubts that we’re looking at something destined to be as ubiquitous as NACA radial engine cowls were in the 30s and 40s and NACA ducts have been since the mid-40s.
@GeorgeC: Einstein’s four papers were basic science and probably not patented nor even patentable. He worked for the Swiss Patent Office and was a university student at the time. As to getting proprietary data, most companies will not sell it to a potential competitor. And most companies that have patents on products they manufacture will gladly sell rights to another company with royalties that make it unprofitable to manufacture a similar product. Are you a Ron Paul supporter?
It seems that many miss that the private company having proprietary processes informs the rest of the industry that the process is possible. That information becoming available almost as soon as the process is deployed. Current example being the Falcon9 hoverslam landings coming up on a decade of use. Compare to government information available on vertical landing of orbital class boosters. Even with the SpaceX proprietary information not being generally released, it is still more readily available than that of agencies that fail to get it done at all after decades of effort(?).
john hare: good point
Anything is easy if you know how; anything is possible if someone else knows how.