When Dan Brown wrote his novel, Angels and Demons, he made a decision based on transportation that should be impossible.  His main character, Robert Langdon, has to travel from his home in Massachusetts to a lab in Switzerland in under an hour. 

It’s an adventure novel, and of course time is of the essence.  

The fictional pilot describes the plane “like a father bragging about his newborn.” (Brown 10)  He goes into great detail, describing what the plane runs on, what it’s composed of, how the jets run, and so on.  His description is so technical, it almost seems as if he’s describing a real plane. 

The pilot goes on to say that “in five years, all you’ll see are these babies – HSCT’s – High Speed Civil Transports.” (Brown 11)    

So Robert Langdon boards a prototype of the Boeing X-33 plane, travels at Mach 15, and arrives at his destination on time.  Surely this can’t be possible in the real world?