Supersonic flight

Supersonic flight is motion through air faster than the local speed of sound. It produces shock waves and changes aerodynamic forces, heating, and drag.

Mach number: Mach number is an object's speed divided by the local speed of sound. It defines supersonic flight as Mach number greater than one.
Speed of sound: The speed of sound is the rate at which small pressure disturbances travel through a medium. Supersonic speed is defined relative to sound traveling through the surrounding air.
Concorde: Concorde was a British-French supersonic passenger airliner that operated from 1976 to 2003. It remains the best-known example of scheduled civilian supersonic flight.
Subsonic flight: Subsonic flight is motion through air below the local speed of sound. Its pressure disturbances travel ahead of the aircraft rather than forming detached shock waves.
Shock wave: A shock wave is a thin region where pressure, temperature, and flow velocity change abruptly. Supersonic aircraft create shock waves as pressure disturbances cannot travel ahead of them.
Compressible flow: Compressible flow is fluid motion in which density changes significantly with pressure. Air density changes become central to aerodynamic behavior at high speeds.
North American X-15: The North American X-15 was a rocket-powered research aircraft that reached hypersonic speeds in the 1960s. Its high-speed flights extended research beyond ordinary supersonic aircraft.
Hypersonic flight: Hypersonic flight is flight at speeds conventionally defined as Mach five or greater. It is a higher-speed regime where intense heating and chemical effects become significant.
Sonic boom: A sonic boom is the sound produced when shock waves from a supersonic object reach an observer. The aircraft's shock waves combine into the boom heard on the ground.
Transonic flight: Transonic flight occurs near the speed of sound, where subsonic and supersonic flow regions coexist. It describes the difficult transition into fully supersonic flight.

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