A new SST?

Japanese jet prototype to rival Concorde

It looks like a winged javelin and would zip along at twice the speed of sound, with the supersonic boom reduced to the tolerable rumble of a Boeing 747. It would go twice the distance of the Concorde, seat three times the passengers, and cut emissions by 75 percent.

Sound like science fiction? Japanese researchers say they're ready to prove it's not.

What with the Airbus A380 and the Boeing Sonic Cruiser, the commercial air industry is everything the space shuttle "industry" is not. That is, alive and well.