British supersonic land vehicle Bloodhound nearly reached the 500mph milestone yesterday, hitting a top speed of 491mph in the South African desert.
It was the car’s sixth run as it tests ahead of its land speed record attempt next year.
The driver, current world land speed record holder Andy Green, is driving Bloodhound faster and faster on each run to gather vital data to prepare the car for its record attempt.
Mr Green said: “The aim of today was to measure the slowdown, from 500 down to 200, to measure the aerodynamic drag. We've got all that data, and now it’s time to crunch the numbers."
