TECH

Scientists design aircraft capable of traversing China and the US in two hours
A team of Chinese scientists designed an ultrafast plane capable of flying between Beijing and New York in two hours and carrying dozens of people and tons of cargo, a Hong Kong newspaper reported."It will take only a couple of hours to travel between Beijing and New York at a hypersonic speed," said Cui Kai, the Chinese Academy of Sciences team leader who developed the prototype in an article reproduced by the South China Morning Post.The aircraft has the capacity to travel at 6,000 kilometers per hour.A passenger plane currently takes 14 hours to travel the 11,000 kilometers that separate Beijing and New York.Called I-plane, it is a biplane model, similar to those used during World War I, to carry more cargo than other hypersonic vehicles, which have an aerodynamic shape and delta wings.The team successfully tested a small version of the plane in a wind tunnel that was also used to test the latest prototype of China's hypersonic weapons.During the test, the plane was launched at nearly seven times the speed of sound - 1,235 kilometers per hour.Countries such as China and the United States are developing hypersonic weapons and vehicles capable of overcoming anti-missile systems.There are, however, no hypersonic vehicles capable of carrying passengers.

Lusa