Supersonic III

We'll close out this short diversion to the supersonic era that never was, and look at the original Boeing design. In competition with Lockheed, Boeing submitted a winning design that included a massive swing wing. The Boeing 2707-100/200 was revolutionary in all aspects; titanium structure, a powerplant that was capable of propelling the aircraft to Mach 3, and an internal seating arrangement that included onboard television. Here is how the original mockup looked on display, all done up in Boeing house colors.

Unfortunately, the swing wing doomed this design. It made the aircraft way too heavy. As shown in this video, Boeing engineers said the aircraft would fly....only without the added weight of passengers! The following are segments taken from the PBS/Nova episode entitled "Supersonic Spies."