San Antonio's key role in high-speed air travel

• It's the first independent company to design, build and fly a supersonic aircraft.

The latest: The XB-1 prototype of a passenger jet broke the sound barrier for the first time last week above the Mojave Desert in California.

• The prototype is one-third the size of the Overture jet that Boom plans to use for passenger flights.

Zoom in: StandardAero in San Antonio will assemble and produce the bespoke engines, called Symphony, for the Overture jet.

• The plane could carry up to 80 passengers at the speed of sound, about twice the speed of today's airliners.
• That could mean flying from Washington, D.C., to Paris in four hours, or from San Francisco to Tokyo in six hours.
• It's designed to fly on 100% sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) made from feedstocks like household solid waste, algae or used cooking oil. That means dramatically lower carbon emissions than traditional jet fuel produces.

• SAFs are in short supply, however, meaning that until production increases, much of the plane's environmental benefits wouldn't be immediately realized.

What's next: Boom has 130 orders and "pre-orders" from American Airlines, United Airlines and Japan Airlines — a five-year pipeline of production, Scholl says.

• Boom expects to begin commercial service by 2029.