The Shuttle Landing Facility at Kennedy Space Center, Florida, was built when NASA decided it wanted to reuse its space rockets. It was used by the Space Shuttle for landing until July 2011. The 3.0-mile section of the landing facility is now used for high-speed testing and just recently, a few Bugatti owners were given the privilege to push their cars to the limits. It turns out, another very interesting speed chase also happened during the Straight Line Aerodynamic Testing event by the French firm.
TopGear decided to see if a Bugatti Chiron Super Sport can hit a higher top speed than the speed of the Space Shuttle when touching the ground. A quick check at NASA’s official site shows the rocket still travels at 110 meters per second at main gear touchdown, which is around 246 miles per hour or almost 396 kilometers per hour. When the drag chute is deployed, that speed drops to approximately 95 meters per second (212.5 mph / 342 kph). Quite a velocity for the Chiron to beat.
