The Bloodhound has shed its blue and orange colours for white and red
The Bloodhound is back and on the hunt to set a new world land speed record (LSR).
Under the new ownership of Ian Warhurst, CEO of Grafton LSR, the freshly assembled Bloodhound LSR team will focus on completing development of the jet- and rocket-powered car and moving to the next phase of the programme – high speed testing – as soon as possible.
The new name, Bloodhound LSR, accompanies a complete rebranding of the programme.
This includes a visual transformation of the car, which was revealed in a new red and white livery as she moved into her new home at SGS Berkeley Green University Technical College (UTC), in the Gloucestershire Science and Technology Park, earlier this month.
“Since buying Bloodhound from the administrators last December, the team and I have been overwhelmed by the passion and enthusiasm the public have shown for the project,” says Warhurst.
“Over the last decade, an incredible amount of hard graft has been invested in the project and it would be a tragedy to see it go to waste.
“Starting with a clean slate, it’s my ambition to let Bloodhound off the leash and see just how fast this car can go. I’ve been reviewing the project and I’m confident there is a commercial business proposition to support it. I’ll provide robust financing to ensure there is cashflow to hit the high-speed testing deadlines we set ourselves.”
Warhurst is joined in his efforts by driver and current world land speed record holder Andy Green, engineering director Mark Chapman, chief financial officer Rick Sturge, operations director Martyn Davidson, commercial director Ewen Honeyman, and many of the original mechanics and technicians, providing continuity from the old programme to the new.
“It was a very hard fight to create the Bloodhound car, the largest science, technology, engineering and mathematics programme in the UK, the public engagement programme and the 1 000-man-year desert preparation,” notes former Bloodhound Programme CEO Richard Noble.
“Our weakness had always been finance and now, after administration, with Ian Warhurst, the team finally has the financial support it needs to drive forward with confidence and achieve what we set out to do nearly 12 years ago.”
The current land-speed record is 1 227.98 km/h.
The Bloodhound project aims to hit speeds of 1 600 km/h at a specially built, 18 km long, 1 500 m wide race track at Hakskeen Pan, in South Africa’s Northern Cape province.