Page 145 - (DK) I Can’t Believe It! 2

IT CAN’T BE TRUE! 143

FAST FACTS

Flyer 4,520 mph (7,274 kph)
X-15—fastest manned aircraft
30 mph
(48 kph) 2,600 mph (4,184 kph)
Mallard duck SpaceShipTwo—fastest passenger spaceplane
65 mph (105 kph) 2,193 mph (3,529 kph)
SR–71 Blackbird—fastest jet aircraft
The first aircraft to fly, the 700 mph (1,126 kph) The fastest aircraft
Wright brothers’ Flyer, reached Cessna Citation X—fastest passenger jet fly to the edge of
a top speed of 30 mph (48 kph). space. Tourists may
This is less than half the speed 249 mph (400 kph) soon travel there
of a mallard duck, which flies Westland Lynx—fastest helicopter in supersonic
at 65 mph (105 kph). space planes.

HTV-2

Bullet speeds vary,
The X-15 but a bullet from an
flew at nearly M16 rifle is quicker
eight times than the fastest
the speed of a fighter jets.
Boeing 747. In 2011, an experimental plane,
the unmanned HTV-2, reached a
2,125 mph speed of 13,000 mph (21,000 kph)—
fast enough to travel from London
(3,420 kph) to Sydney, Australia, in under an hour.

4,520 mph
The X-15 couldn’t take off like an ordinary plane. The
experimental aircraft was carried by a bomber to its cruising (7,274 kph)
altitude. Only then did the X-15 fire up its rocket engines.

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