Patrick Stoliker  – Deputy Director
NASA Dryden Flight Research Center

I left off begging a question in my last blog: despite 60 years of modernity that include six trips to the moon and back, the advent of the internet, and in the field of medicine things like magnetic resonance imaging and nano technology, not to mention Voyager leaving our solar system, we are still flying at virtually the same speed and altitude as did passengers on the first commercial jet service in 1952. Why? Has aeronautical technology peaked? Is aerospace a“mature technology” the same way that dirigibles are? Are there no more questions to ask in this field? Or are we on the cusp of the next golden era of aircraft development.

When the Germans asked General Anthony McAuliffe to surrender at the Battle of the Bulge in 1944, he reportedly said:“Nuts!” That’s my answer to the rhetorical question I posed.

First of all, there are plenty of aeronautical questions left to ask and answer, which is why, after more than 60years, we’re still here at the same desert outpost those 13 people came to in1946.

 Here’s some questions: can we make aircraft fly supersonically—over land—and suppress the shock wave that goes with it enough so that the noise is acceptable to the people on the ground? Can we do this and also improve the fuel efficiency of the same aircraft?

Here’s another question: can we actually reduce the cost of putting a pound of something—anything—into space? It’s run close to $10,000 per pound since I’ve been alive, and since I’ve been alive the quest has been to reduce that figure. There have been different plans, and Dryden has been involved in several of them, and we’re involved in another as I write this now. This is especially relevant since NASA’s mission has shifted from delivering goods to Low Earth Orbit (LEO) to exploring deep space; now the delivery job is going to private industry and our job—NASA’s job—is to nurture industry in this new venture. Finding ways to reduce the cost of access to space is serious business, not pie-in-the-sky stuff. These are questions that need answers.

Meanwhile, we at Dryden haven’t been sitting still these past 60 years, even if it might seem that way because we’re still traveling at the same speed as the folks who flew on Yoke Peter. While there are more of us in an airliner fuselage then ever, the range of the aircraft has increased dramatically and fuel consumption improved. That’s because the engines have become more efficient. They are also far quieter than before. If you don’t believe me, go find a Boeing 737-200 and get close to it when it takes off; when–and if–your hearing comes back we’ll go find a Boeing 737-800 and compare its takeoff noise level. On top of that, you can watch the -200 for a long, long time after it flies away because of its exhaust plume; the current crop of jet engines operate more efficiently and leave far less pollution in the atmosphere than did the previous generation.These are improvements most people tend not to notice—they’re qualitative not quantitative jumps—but NASA has had a hand in all this. Every time passengers get on an airliner that has winglets they should think two things: better fuel efficiency and NASA. (Think: Whitcomb and a KC-135 flown here at Dryden)

The seats passengers sit in, the way they are anchored to the floor, the fabric the seats are made of, the lighting on the floor that leads to an exit–these things and more are safety features that NASA Dryden has directly affected but which passengers are completely unaware of while they sip their sodas at 35,000 feet—they can’t even get snacks anymore—and don’t think about messing with your electronic device on the runway!! (Remember the Boeing 720 and the Controlled Impact Demonstration?) Life is better because of the continued questions we ask here.

There was a brief moment when it looked like we were all going to fly a bit faster as airline passengers. In 1972 engineers at Dryden began flying a Vought F-8 Crusader with a new wing on it. Designed by Richard Whitcomb of NASA Langley, the Supercritical Wing was expected to delay the onset of pre-Mach buffet and the dramatic jump in drag that accompanies an aircraft as it approaches Mach. Whitcomb’s radical new wing design did both,and the airlines were keen on getting planes with the new airfoil so they could fly faster. It would take a while for the manufacturers to get a plane to the market—it always does, but the airlines would be ready; and then the first gas peace time gas crisis in American history hit (ca. 1974-). After that the airlines still wanted the supercritical wing—and they got them—but they never flew any faster then they ever did.

We continue to make incremental improvements in all classes of aircraft from micro-UAVS through general aviation,commercial, and high performance. But we still seem to be living in the shadow of the last golden age of aeronautics development.

So when you look around and say “we aren’t going any faster,” you could be saying “we are going the same as we did but doing it so much more cleanly, so much more quietly, so much more efficiently,so much more safely, at far less risk than ever before, and NASA and Dryden has had an enormous role in all of this, every step of the way!”

I’ll finish one more question, “What is going to trigger the next golden era of aeronautics?”