Boeing Sonic Cruiser

The Boeing Sonic Cruiser was a concept jet airliner with a delta wing–canard configuration. It was distinguished from conventional airliners by its delta wing and high-subsonic/transonic cruising speed of up to Mach 0.98. Boeing first proposed it in 2001, but airlines generally preferred lower operating costs over higher speed. Boeing ended the Sonic Cruiser project in December 2002 and shifted to the slower (Mach 0.85) but more fuel-efficient 7E7 (later named 787 Dreamliner) airliner.

Design and development

The Sonic Cruiser was born from one of numerous outline research and development projects that began in the 1990s at Boeing with the goal to look at potential designs for a possible new near-sonic or supersonic airliner. The Sonic Cruiser was publicly unveiled on March 29, 2001. Boeing had recently withdrawn its proposed 747X derivative from competition with the Airbus A380 when not enough airline interest was forthcoming, and instead proposed the Sonic Cruiser as a completely different approach. Instead of the A380's massive capacity, requiring a hub and spoke model of operation, the Sonic Cruiser was designed for rapid point-to-point connections for 200 to 250 passengers. Critics stated that Boeing had timed its announcement in an attempt to distract from the launch of the A380.

Boeing's 2001 patent detailed the breadth of delta wing-canard concepts studied, which included a supersonic variant with four engines capable of cruising at Mach 1.5 to 3.0, various tail, engine location, and inlet and outlet configurations, smaller supersonic and subsonic business jets, and what Boeing called a "modular" system, where the cruise speed could be changed from supersonic to near-sonic by an interchangeable nose; the "Sonic Cruiser" was a near-sonic variant.