[MUSIC] JOAN CARTAN-HANSEN, HOST: Humans have been trying to figure out how to fly for centuries.
Early attempts were... unsuccessful.
[MUSIC] In 1903, Wilber and Orville Wright traveled for 12 seconds for the first official human flight.
In 1947, Chuck Yeager became the first person to fly at supersonic speed.
That faster than the speed of sound!
Planes flying that fast create a sonic boom [BOOM]  at that speed.
The fastest plane to date is the Lockheed sr-71 Blackbird.
It travels at almost 2,175 miles per hour or 3500 kilometers per hour.
But the fastest thing to fly is the NASA X-43a, an unmanned experimental aircraft that reached a record-breaking speed of MACH 9.6.
That's approximately 7,366 mph.
For more information about flight, check out the Science Trek website.
You'll find it at ScienceTrek.org