THE "HAJJ" SST (SUPERSONIC TRANSPORTER) THAT MUSLIM COUNTRIES CAN BUILD


Every year millions of Muslims from around the world travel to Mecca to perform pilgrimage or hajj. Most of them travel by air using passenger jets from Asia, Africa, Europe and South and North America. If they travel from East Asia or Europe, their travelling time is between 6 to 8 hours, and if they travel from North America, their travelling time is more than 12 hours, while if they travel from South America, their travelling time can reach up to 24 hours. This traveling time is recorded by their using of conventional contemporary Airbus or Boeing passenger jets.

Due to the very large numbers of pilgrimage travelling by air, every year such traveling agents reserve thousands of passengers jets costing billions of dollars. These millions of pilgrims are ready market for the passenger jets, and also a significant contributor to both the airline services and aircraft manufacturing industries. This fact actually enables Muslim countries or a consortium of a Muslim countries, or even a capable Muslim country to develop SST (supersonic transporter), passenger jet that can fly beyond Mach 1.0 or the speed of sound. 

SST will reduce half or 50% or more of the travelling time of the pilgrim and when out of the pilgrimage season, the SST can serve the conventional air travelling market. 

A Muslim country can develop the "Hajj SST" with the collaboration of an established passenger aircraft manufacturer that has been manufacturing medium size passenger jets either Airbus, Boeing, Bombardier, Embraer, Alenia or Mitsubishi, and use the guaranteed market of pilgrimage to fund the project. A scheme where the SST sales and services will subsidize the pilgrimage can even be created when the SST starts to serve other markets regularly.

A concept that may be considered for Hajj SST is "Y-fuselage", where the fuselage instead of just a tube as in conventional design, is in the shape of "Y". The Y-fuselage SST will double the passenger carrying capacity of a medium size jet without doubling the length and wingspan of the jet, meaning a single-aisle Y-fuselage SST (narrow-body) can carry passengers as many as that of double-aisles passenger jet (wide-body).

Top view concept of a Y-fuselage SST with "clean wing".

Y-fuselage concept will enable the usage of "clean wing" (free of wing-mounted engines), because all the engines can be mounted between the "rear fuselages". Clean wing is very significant in the performance of SST as clean wing is more aerodynamic enabling supersonic flight to be reached more easily and economically. Not only clean wing is more aerodynamic, but it is also lighter and simpler to manufacture, and simplicity means more economic.

Side views showing the engines between the rear fuselages.

Having the engines between the rear fuselages enables for better safety because the engines are fully hidden from the passengers boarding the SST. This will also enable shorter turn around time because the engines can be safely ignited and warmed up while the passengers are boarding the plane.

Bottom view showing that the engines are not visible.

The SST can also be made quieter by having the engine hidden from the bottom, meaning that the engines are not visible when viewed from the bottom. This configuration will reflect the sound of the engines upward and the SST will be quieter during take-off and landing, which is much preferred by the public, airports and airline operators.

Front and rear views with the rear view showing the engines.

With this, Muslim countries, including Malaysia and Saudi Arabia or others can start looking at the Hajj SST as a possible passenger aircraft manufacturing project with a ready market. There are financing and investment institutions in Muslim countries that assist in financing the pilgrimage, such as Tabung Haji in Malaysia, that may consider to study the feasibility of owning and operating the Hajj SST.

As for the pilgrims. they can start look forward to significantly cut short their travelling time by at least 50% the current air travelling time, while the global airlines may look forward to finally operate cost effective supersonic transporter.

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