Pressure creates diamonds 💎⁣⁣ ⁣⁣ Our X-59 quiet supersonic aircraft recently successfully completed a series of engine performance tests while at Lockheed Martin Skunk Works in Palmdale, California. During maximum afterburner testing – a test that demonstrates the engine’s ability to create the thrust needed for supersonic flight – a photographer caught a cool visual phenomenon in the X-59’s exhaust called Mach diamonds. Also known as shock diamonds, Mach diamonds occur when the pressure of the gases exiting the nozzle is less than the ambient air pressure.⁣⁣ ⁣⁣ One of the major problems with commercial supersonic flight is the loudness of a sonic boom. The X-59 is the centerpiece of NASAaero’s Quesst mission, which seeks to reduce that boom to a gentle “thump.” Designing and building the X-59 was one of the Quesst mission’s goals; the other is to fly the X-59 over several U.S. communities, gather data on public responses to the sound, and deliver that data to national and internation...