Did you know?
REMEMBER ISSUE 15? We told you the SR-71 Blackbird was the fastest plane ever built, zooming along at Mach 3 +( 2,200 mph). One sharp-eyed reader wrote in to say... not so fast! Turns out we weren ' t totally wrong: the SR-71 really is the fastest jet-powered plane ever to fly. But " jet-powered " is just one kind of fast. Here ' s the full speed lineup!
FASTEST PLANE A HUMAN HAS EVER FLOWN: X-15
This rocket-powered plane blew past the SR-71 at Mach 6.72, that ' s 4,520 mph, back in 1967. It flew high enough to cross the edge of outer space!
12 | LET’ S GO AEROSPACE