Wow.
(CNN) – What has a jet engine, a rocket booster and travels on a set of aluminum wheels? It’s the Bloodhound SuperSonic Car (SSC) and it has plans to hit the world land speed record at 1,000 mph.
Made of titanium, carbon fiber and, like superman, is designed to go faster than a speeding bullet, the Bloodhound SSC has been painstakingly put together and tested over the better part of six years.
In 2016, the UK-based team plan to take the 42-foot (8.9m) vehicle to Hakskeen Pan, a dry lake bed in South Africa, for a crack at the record breaking attempt.
Former fighter jet pilot Royal Air Force (RAF) Wing Commander Andy Green said even designing a car that can hold together at these blistering speeds has been a triumph of the engineer’s art.
“No rubber,” he told CNN from The Bloodhound Project headquarters in Bristol, UK. "Beyond about 450mph it’s really, really hard to keep a tire on - they just get flung off. So we have solid aluminum.
“We’ve been through a huge evolution of finding something that’s tough enough that would do the job. Basically this car goes faster than a speeding bullet, so anything that hits this is like being shot at from a gun.”
The former jet ace, who has flown combat missions over Iraq, Bosnia and Afghanistan, can lay claim to be the only man to have broken the sound barrier in the air and on land. In 1997, he hit 763 mph or Mach 1 in the vehicle ThrustSSC to become the first man to break the sound barrier on land.
The Bloodhound Project takes the land speed record a step further in a car that is part jet fighter, part Formula 1 racer and part space rocket.
“A thousand miles an hour at ground level is faster than any jet fighter has ever traveled in history, so there are going to be some major challenges,” Green said.
Besides three engines delivering 135,000 horsepower, the Bloodhound is equipped with rocket boosters to deliver the thrust necessary to get it to 1,000 mph.
"(The jet engines) on their own will take us to 600mph or thereabouts, but to g
Just a growing stage for man.