Air travel: Planes are now flying faster than the speed of sound

Storms fuelled by an increasingly strong North Atlantic jet stream, believed to be linked to climate change, have elevated some recent transatlantic commercial flights to near-record-breaking speeds.

Storms, such as Eowyn in January, are being fuelled by an increasingly strong North Atlantic jet stream, which is speeding up as a direct result of climate change.

Recent years have seen numerous commercial passenger aircraft riding piggy-back on these currents to reach unheard of speeds.

The North Atlantic jet stream flows west to east, and in winter often becomes faster, creating more storms.

Since supersonic Concorde retired in 2003, no commercial passenger jet can fly faster than the speed of sound (1,192 kmph) – unless it rides the jet stream. Today’s passenger jets have a cruising speed of 960 kmph.

The current record holder is a United Airlines Boeing 787, which attained a speed of 1,344kmph on a flight from New York to Lisbon on February 17, 2024.

That is beyond the speed of sound and much faster than the plane can actually fly. However, the aircraft maintained its normal cruising speed, relative to the air outside it. It’s just that the air around it was the jet stream, and it was moving at hundreds of kilometres an hour itself.