MIT Designs Aircraft That Uses 70% Less Fuel Than Conventional Planes

greenrainbow writes "Today a team of researchers at MIT unveiled their design for an airplane that uses 70% less fuel than conventional aircraft. The MIT design comes thanks to a NASA-funded initiative to increase fuel efficiency, lower emissions, and allow planes to take off on shorter runways. The team accomplished all of NASA's set goals with their innovative D-series plane, lovingly referred to as the 'double bubble,' which has thinner, longer wings and a smaller tail, and engine placement at the rear of the plane instead of on the wings."

Re:hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

interesting. Does anyone else like to stuff sausages up their asshole?

Re:So Lets See,

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Well, that and a bottle of jack daniel's, yeah...

Re:Intrigued to know more

[blair1q]

Of course, when the airlines get these, there will be a "green" fee, a "designed by MIT" fee and an "environmental feel good" fee added onto your ticket price along with all the junk fees.

And then there's the fee for adding on the fees...

Re:So Lets See,

[Dun Malg]

No, you're supposed to throw a bunch of airplane parts in a hangar and have a hurricane assemble them into a 747.

That's how creationists think evolution works, anyway.

Re:So Lets See,

[EdZ]

It's not impossible. I used to bullseye flow dynamic calculations on my Ti-15 back home, they're not much bigger than two OOM.

Re:hmmm

[Pence128]

The faster you go, the less time you spend going.

Hmmm... slower than a 737

[DieByWire]

the design mitigates some of the drawbacks of the BLI technique by traveling about 10 percent slower than a 737.

I wonder if they accounted for the added weight of beefing up the trailing edge of the wing to withstand bird strikes.

And that's why math education is so important

[A nonymous Coward]

The fees for adding on the fees for adding on the fees need calculus to calculate correctly, and since there are so many variations on the fees, a canned list won't so. Thus we need to make sure that all ticket agents know calculus!!!!!

Re:Slower than current aircraft

[BitHive]

Uh, excuse me I'm pretty sure anything American beats the pants off anything European. That's home come it's America, jackass.

Re:Intrigued to know more

[timeOday]

Recalling the BWB work done at McDonell Douglas and Boeing in the '90s, there was considerable resistance from passenger focus groups who could not get comfortable not seeing windows.

Well, they could always put windows in the floor to make people feel better.

Boom?

[Lost Penguin]

Where's the kaboom? There was supposed to be an earth-shattering kaboom!

Re:hmmm

[Hadlock]

Well hey, since it's apparently free to fly at supersonic speeds, you could just fly south over Houston, once you hit the gulf just fly around the tip of Florida and up to London!!! It'd be even easier flying from LA - just head south around the tip of Argentina off the coast of south america and it's a straight shot to London!

Re:hmmm

[Jarik C-Bol]

Personally, with the deadly safety record of swimming (sharks, jellyfish, cramps, exhaustion) i think I'd rather just stay home and look at pictures of cats on the internet.

Pushing tin

[ArundelCastle]

and engine placement at the rear of the plane instead of on the wings.

Rear wheel drive? Nuh-uh. Bigger chance of hydroplaning. ;)

Or as they like to say on WestJet... "should this flight become a cruise..."