NASA’s Langley Research Center has completed its final round of testing on the eXternal Vision System (XVS) for the agency’s X-59 Quiet SuperSonic Technology (QueSST) aircraft. According to NASA, the system has already been shipped to X-59 builder Lockheed Martin for installation. Designed to replace a forward-facing window, the XVS is a camera and display system aimed at providing “an augmented reality view of the X-59 pilot’s forward line-of-sight along with graphical flight data overlays.”
I hope they have more luck with the view system than Boeing and USAF on their newest tanker.
Like weather guessers without a window, don’t think I could trust a plane without one either…but then again, did the engineers design for pilots or “specimens”?
…or is it a “Spirit of St Louis” high-tech periscope augmenting peripheral view?.. in the event of failure, side-slipping to see runway probably not recommended.
No forward “window” but that is a heck of a camera blister. You’d think they could just mount the camera in the leading edge of the vertical stabilizer. Or for that matter, on the nose of the aircraft.
How many times is NASA gonna test sonic boom demo airplanes … until they run out of other people’s money? I worked on a project like this nearly 20 years ago funded by NASA and DARPA and … here we go again.
AND, yeah … a pop up periscope would be a wise back up. Are the FAA people who are OCD over safety gonna allow this thing to fly over people?