NASA’s Plans to Assess Annoyance Caused by Supersonic Overflights of the X-59 Aircraft

In its mission to expand knowledge and improve aviation, NASA conducts research to address sonic boom noise, the prime barrier to overland supersonic flight. For half a century, civilian aircraft have been required to fly slower than the speed of sound when over land to prevent sonic boom disturbances from impacting communities under the flight path. However, reduced sonic boom noise levels may be achieved via new aircraft shaping techniques that limit the merging of shockwaves generated during supersonic flight. NASA’s piloted research aircraft, the X-59, was built to demonstrate reduced sonic boom noise during supersonic flight and took its first flight in October 2025. After the completion of flight testing to ensure the aircraft performs as designed, NASA will begin a national campaign of supersonic flights over communities to collect data on how people perceive the noise from this new design. The data will support the efforts of national and international noise regulators to develop new standards that would allow supersonic flight over land at reduced noise levels. This paper summarizes key research results on which the X-59 community surveys are based, as well as current plans for NASA’s X-59 community survey campaign.