$300M Site for the Aerion Supersonic AS2 Jet

Aerion Supersonic starts the development of new Florida facilities to produce the AS2 supersonic business jet in 2023.

Formerly home in Nevada, aircraft company Aerion Supersonic has recently broken ground on Aerion Park, a new multipurpose 110.6-acre facility joined by taxiway to the Orlando Melbourne International Airport, and positioned near a growing cluster of aerospace and technology companies on Florida’s Space Coast.

This facility with its building’s comprising an area of 2,000,000 square feet, will now be the home of Aerion Supersonic’s global headquarters as well as an integrated campus for research, design and assembly of the AS2 supersonic business jet and future hypersonic aircraft.

To the side of the main site, a new Aerion Customer Experience Center will allow customers direct access to the runway of Orlando Melbourne International Airport. The new experience center will include a customer completions center and a full-size AS2 cabin mock-up, affording customers the opportunity to customize their chosen interior specifications such as configuration options, materials, colors and finishes.

“We are grateful and proud to be the home of Aerion’s new global headquarters where the AS2 business jet will come to life,” said Greg Donovan, A.A.E. executive director at Orlando Melbourne International Airport (MLB). “With more than $100m reinvested into our airfield over the last few years, our new runways and air traffic control tower are ready to support this revolution in supersonic flight. Aerion is a special part of our Space Coast community’s future and we are eager to see the path forward as we welcome the fine talent that will be joining our thriving aerospace campus at MLB.”

The Aerion Park facility represents a capital investment of more than $300m in construction, machinery and equipment, and is forecasted to bring at least 675 new jobs in Florida by 2026 as the company ramps-up operations.

Between now, and the 2023 production start date of the supersonic AS2, Aerion will be recruiting aircraft builders, designers, engineers, programmers and scientists with an average annual wage of $105,000, marking a 220% increase on the 2019 average salary in Brevard County. Further jobs will go on to be created through the AS2 program lifecycle in design, certification, aircraft production and aftermarket support.

“A future where humanity can travel between any two points on our planet in three hours or less”

Tom Vice, Aerion Chairman, President & CEO

“This is a truly exciting day for Aerion as we launch our new home and the future of sustainable supersonic flight here in Melbourne, Florida,” says Tom Vice, Aerion’s Chairman, President & CEO. “We are building the future of mobility – a future where humanity can travel between any two points on our planet in three hours or less. We will change the world and bring a new sustainable means of supersonic and hypersonic flight to reality and it will happen here, at Aerion Park.”

Just as the AS2 seeks to deliver carbon neutral flight, the home in which it will be created aims to be the most environmentally sustainable of its kind in the aerospace sector. Aerion Park is planned to be powered by clean energy – using the very latest in photovoltaic solar technology to generate energy for manufacturing. On-site electric vehicle charging stations will also be installed and rainwater that lands on the campus will be reused. Recycled materials will be incorporated in the construction of Aerion Park wherever possible, sourced locally to minimize emissions and the Park will be dedicated to creating zero waste.

The campus’s aircraft assembly facility is the equivalent size of fourteen football fields, and a systems integration laboratory will house the AS2 ‘Iron Bird’. The Iron Bird is a raw framework test rig in which major working components are installed in the relative locations found on an aircraft’s actual airframe. This rig is then usually surrounded by scaffolding arranged in the skeletal shape of the aircraft being tested to allow personnel to gain access to the components to be analyzed.

Also included at the Aerion site will be the engineering flight test headquarters. This facility will enable flight crews, mechanics and support personnel to fly AS2 aircraft in the certification flight test program as well as conduct serial production testing prior to customer delivery. Aerion intends to flight test the AS2 from the site, in the surrounding airspace, in supersonic testing corridors as well as at additional offsite locations.

Key Aerion AS2 Milestone Accomplished

Recently, in November this year, Aerion announced that the AS2 had completed a major milestone, after concluding high and low speed wind tunnel testing, amassing hundreds of simulated flight hours which represented the equivalent of 78,000 nautical miles flown.

Testing, in combination with the200,000+ data points amassed from Aerion’s AS2 digital modelling, allowed engineers to validate the precise aerodynamic shape of the jet to a high level of fidelity and detail which was concluded in some of the most renowned testing facilities in Europe and North America.

During testing the full operational envelope of the AS2 was assessed – from take-off and landing, subsonic cruise, Boomless CruiseTM, supersonic cruise through to dive speed. The wind tunnel testing also allows Aerion’s engineering team to assess aerodynamic impact in key operational conditions, such as deployment of landing gear and wing icing while also assessing handling qualities.

More About The Aerion Supersonic AS2

The Aerion AS2 is a supersonic private jet and the starting point in Aerion’s pursuit of faster and sustainable point-to-point travel. Introduced as having the first new civil supersonic engine in 50 years, the AS2 will also have technology called Boomless Cruise™ that ensures a sonic boom never reaches the ground. The business jet is set to achieve supersonic cruising at Mach 1.4 and subsonic cruising at Mach 0.95.

Aimed to be inherently environmentally responsible from the first flight, the AS2 is the first supersonic jet designed to be powered by 100 percent synthetic fuel and reach supersonic speeds without the need for an afterburner. Inside, the cabin of the AS2 is designed to seat 8-12 passengers.

Aerion Supersonic plans to deliver 300 aircraft over ten years of production, supported by a growing domestic and international order backlog which now tops $6.5 billion.