“The images are interesting but I’m not feeling the excitement.”
This type of imagery has been possible in wind tunnels for a long time, but there you’re dealing with scale models and no engine plume.
This is imaging the shock waves from actual airplanes, with engines in afterburner. The interaction between the shock waves and the engine exhaust had never been observed before.
The big excitement, though, is that this will be used to refine the design of the new “quiet” supersonic transport...that is as long as the “Green New Deal” insanity is defeated.
At least in a declassified format.
The big excitement, though, is that this will be used to refine the design of the new “quiet” supersonic transport.
I'm genuinely trying to understand so please be patient, I'm not an aeronautical engineer.
From the image, I don't see anything significant about the shockwave interactions. There is a small region of turbulence but that seems to be overcome by the shockwave of the trailing aircraft which shows increasing symmetry with distance.