Transatlantic British Airways Flight Nears Supersonic Speeds, Flies JFK-LHR in Under 6 Hours
Joe Cortez January 13, 2015
A transatlantic British Airways flight reached near-supersonic speeds thanks to a fast jet stream, reducing the total flight time by 90 minutes.
Passengers on British Airways Flight 114 from John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK) to London Heathrow Airport (LHR) arrived at their destination well ahead of schedule last week. The Telegraph reports BA114, which took to the air January 7, arrived in London just over five hours after takeoff thanks to strong tailwinds. The jet stream increased the ground speed of the Boeing 777-200 to around 745 mph — 16 mph below the speed of sound at ground level.
The overnight flight was scheduled to take seven hours, but the west-to-east tailwind helped BA114 arrive at LHR nearly 90 minutes ahead of schedule. Weather charts reviewed by The Telegraph indicate that the speed of the unusually wide jet stream was 220 knots (250 mph).
According to former pilots, it’s not unusual for flights to use transatlantic jet streams to save fuel and shorten flight times when traveling east. However, last week’s unusual jet stream surprised even veteran flyers.
“You try to sit in the core of the jet where it’s not too turbulent and where you can pick up some free mileage,” former British Airways pilot Alastair Rosenschein told The Telegraph. “It’s not unusual to get 100 mph tailwinds but [these pilots] have got more than that. This must be a record.”
The top speed of BA114 was just over half of that of the retired Concorde. Once operated by British Airways, the Concorde had a maximum ground speed of over 1,300 mph, and the supersonic airliner was capable of flying across the Atlantic Ocean in just under 3.5 hours.
[Photo: British Airways]
You’re Reading
Interesting, but still not a transatlantic record. Way back in March 1979 a VC-10 flew from JFK to Prestwick in five hours and one minute - still the fastest ever transatlantic crossing by a subsonic passenger jet - and I bet its airspeed was a whole lot faster! You can read the pilot's own account here: http://www.vc10.net/Memories/testing_earlydays.html#AtlanticDash
Pretty poor decision to post this article. Ground speed has ZERO to due with breaking the speed of sound on an aircraft. True airspeed would be the indicator of whether the sound barrier is broken. Lots of planes can reach over 745 mph in the air with a good enough tailwind. But the machine is only moving through the mass of air at the TAS.
I flew AA107 LHR JFK Saturday. Flight time 8 hrs 20 mins or so. Longest flight I have had on this route. Hope my return benefits though.
Now - what was the ground speed of a return flight from LHR to JFK? Recently flew a USA transcon from East to West and the ground speed for most of the flight was close to 400 MPH. And at one point it was down to 262 MPH. Some heavy air currents out there this winter.
Airspeed and groundspeed are two very different things. Terrible headline.