What Happened?
Reno, NV-based Aerion Corporation Promoted Richard Tracy as Chief Technology Officer
About the Company
Aerion is the industry leader in supersonic aircraft. The company is pioneering a new generation of efficient, economical, and environmentally responsible supersonic aircraft. Aerion`s AS2 supersonic business jet is poised to revolutionize global mobility with first flight scheduled for 2023 and certification in 2025. The AS2 is as much as 70 percent faster than subsonic business jets. Supersonic cruise speed is Mach 1.4, about 1,000 mph. It saves as much as three hours across the Atlantic and more than five hours across the Pacific. Aerion and Boeing partnered in February 2019 to develop this ground-breaking aircraft. Boeing has made a significant investment in Aerion to accelerate technology development and aircraft design, and unlock supersonic air travel for new markets. In October 2018, Aerion and GE Aviation unveiled GE`s quiet and efficient Affinity engine, the first supersonic engine in more than 50 years.
About the Person
Richard Tracy is an aerodynamicist whose extensive research on supersonic natural laminar flow led to the present SNLF wing concept, which he first patented in 1994. He formed the ASSET Group in 1991, and later Asset Research Corp., to pursue development of commercial applications of SNLF technology. Asset Research Corp. became Aerion Corporation in 2002. As Aerion’s chief technology officer, Dr. Tracy is responsible for technology development and design oversight of supersonic aircraft incorporating SNLF technology. He has worked on a number of classified defense programs and civil aircraft development and certification projects, including the single stage to orbit X-30 and the Northrop Grumman “Global Hawk.” As Chief Engineer for Bill Lear’s LearAvia in the 1970s, he led the advanced design of the LearStar 600, which was later developed as the Canadair CL-600 Challenger. He initiated the design of the carbon composite Lear Fan and led the development effort on that aircraft through its successful first flight. Between the years1997 and 2001, he was principal investigator on three DARPA contracts related to applications of SNLF technology. Dr. Tracy holds BS, MS and PhD degrees from Caltech, the latter in Hypersonic Aerodynamics, which he earned in 1964. He attended the Brussels-based NATO Von Karman Institute in 1959-60 as the General Motors Fellow, and was awarded the Von Karman Prize for his thesis on heat transfer in separated supersonic flows. Tracy has been a licensed pilot since 1953 with over 1,500 hours in a variety of aircraft.
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