Why is the English Electric Lightning so Ugly? – A Nasty Shock! I’ve always thought the English Electric Lightning looks like the Grinch. That face. That nose. But the more I looked at it the more I realised that ugliness is entirely deliberate — and what’s hiding behind that Grinch-like nose cone is one of the most extraordinary pieces of engineering cunning ever put on an aircraft. Because here’s what nobody tells you about supersonic flight. Getting into the sky takes brute force and ignorance — raw engine thrust punching the aircraft upward through the sound barrier against air that is doing everything it possibly can to stop you. Breaking through Mach 1 is violent, dramatic and expensive in fuel. But staying there at Mach 2, Mach 3 and beyond — that takes guile. At supersonic cruise it isn’t the engines doing most of the work. It’s the air itself. The same air that tried to stop you

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