Provide the infrastructure necessary for the safe, sustainable and effective development of supersonic commercial aircraft in America by representing the interests of the aerospace industry to the responsible governments
Create a 800-mile civilian supersonic and hypersonic corridor over Eastern Washington in partnership with the FAA, State government and the aerospace industry
Aerospace OEMs need non-military airspace to test and certify new supersonic civilian aircraft
The development of a supersonic and hypersonic corridor will bring new investment in the aerospace industry to the Northwest
Moses Lake is the perfect place to base your development flight test program.
Aligning industry and government
Continue the legacy of supersonic flight test in Moses Lake
Who is SSFA?
We are an alliance of aerospace industry leaders. AeroTEC the Port of Moses Lake and the Aerospace Flight Alliance are primary members. We coordinate with OEMs and Government Agencies, including the FAA.
What is the intent of the SSFA?
Our vision is to provide the infrastructure necessary for the safe, sustainable and effective development of supersonic commercial aircraft in America by representing the interests of the Aerospace Industry to the responsible governments. Specifically, we proposed to the FAA to establish a 800 mile civilian supersonic and hypersonic corridor over Eastern Washington, in partnership with the FAA and the aerospace industry.
What will be the noise impact of a supersonic corridor to the population and wildlife below the corridor?
NASA and the aerospace industry are developing new technologies to reduce or eliminate the sonic boom of supersonic flight. This new technology includes "boomless" supersonic flight by refracting the sonic boom through the atmosphere before it hits the ground, or by reducing the sonic boom to a "thump" equivalent to closing the door of your car.
Will the noise from the supersonic corridor be similar to the noisy military jets flying supersonic over my house or at airshows?
Most military jets do not fly supersonic, but they do have noisy afterburning engines that are designed to produce high thrust at the expense of noise. Future civilian supersonic aircraft will be completely different: they will feature quiet engines that will meet all the FAA noise regulations, just like the quieter airliners in production today and they will be flying 8-10 miles high.
Why not use military airspace where supersonic flight is already approved?
Yes, that is a possibility, but application for access to this airspace by civilian organizations is limited (the military always has priority) and their corridor is too short for effective testing at higher Mach Numbers.
Why not simply test supersonic aircraft over the water?
During early development flights, it is safer to fly over land for access to alternate airports in the event of an emergency. Furthermore, the infrastructure for testing such as test data transfer via telemetry and access to ground microphone arrays is only effective over land. During later flights, a ground-based corridor is closer to the test airport, thus improving test efficiency and burning less fuel to get to a corridor over the ocean.
Why do you need a dedicated supersonic test corridor? Why not test anywhere over the USA?
A dedicated test area makes sense for a variety of reasons. In addition to safety and infrastructure considerations, it will make it easier and safer to deconflict airspace between supersonic test aircraft and passenger airline traffic.
When will the supersonic corridor be approved?
Not for a while. SSFA is advocating that research be performed as a joint effort between industry and the FAA to determine the feasibility of creating such a corridor.
What does SSFA propose, specifically?
The SSFA submitted a detailed description in response to the FAA's Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, a copy of which is available on the FAA's web site and also available in the downloads section below.
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