Georgia Tech student builds turbojet plane that can hit 500mph inside his college dorm room and Elon Musk and a jet CEO respond to it

This Georgia Tech student has Elon Musk and a jet CEO interested after he built a turbojet plane in his college dorm room.

Tomas Salvo says his plane – named Reaper – is capable of flying 500mph.

Salvo has branded Reaper the ‘world’s fastest RC airplane’.

It’s no wonder that he’s getting so much attention.

This Georgia Tech student built something remarkable

We’ve seen plenty of college students wow us with their talents over the years.

At Brigham Young University in Utah, several students joined together to create a supermileage vehicle which could travel thousands of miles on one gallon of fuel.

Across the Atlantic in Northern Ireland, some students put their efforts towards an electric version of the DeLorean.

There are millions of bright minds developing in colleges around the world, which should make us all feel excited about the future.

And that’s no different in the case of Tomas Salvo, a Georgia Tech student, who’s been making waves online recently.

In a post to X, he revealed what he’d been working on in his college dorm room.

“Since February, I’ve designed and built the world’s fastest RC airplane in my college dorm, and that’s not clickbait,” he wrote.

“Reaper has a 5kg carbon-fiber frame, 250N turbojet, and flies at 500mph.”

The name is cool enough, let alone the impressive stats that come with this thing.

It looks like something that came straight out of the Thunderbirds TV show.

The origins of Reaper

In a follow-up post, he expanded a little more on the story behind Reaper.

He’d come across a broken turbine that had been in pieces for years.

Since February, I've designed and built the world's fastest RC airplane in my college dorm, and that’s not clickbait. Reaper has a 5kg carbon-fiber frame, 250N turbojet, and flies at 500mph. New to X and will be going through the whole build here in the coming days.#aerospace pic.twitter.com/5PPZCLvRWm

— Tomas Salvo (@tomas_salvo22) July 2, 2026

The club to whom the turbine belonged agreed to let him use it if he could fix it.

“I was ecstatic and got to work, but nothing about this engine existed online, so I reverse-engineered it,” Salvo explained.

By fixing the kerosene igniter, patching up the combustion chamber, and designing a new nozzle, he had a working 200N turbojet on his hands.

However, it was at this point that the club wanted its engine back.

In desperation, Salvo put out a bunch of cold emails in a bid to find a new engine.

After landing sponsorships from Anduril Industries, JetCat, Automation Direct, and Tractian, he got the show back on the road.

With their support, he bought a new turbine engine, and designed the airframe of Reaper.

In his biggest landmark yet, he flew a 3D-printed scale electric version.

The story of Reaper is just beginning.

It’s no wonder Elon Musk is intrigued by this turbojet

Since he shared his story online, Salvo has received a whole load of attention.

His tweets have received millions of views, and have made their way to X CEO, Elon Musk.

“Launch it from a tall mountain for low air density and you might be able to go supersonic in a dive,” he wrote.

And it wasn’t just him who was intrigued.

Founder of Boom Technology, Blake Scholl, also weighed in with his verdict.

“Boom will be offering a prize – $50k cash and $50k in Boom stock – for the first amateur-built RC airplane to exceed Mach 1,” he wrote.

Now there’s an incentive if we ever heard of one.

We can’t wait to see what happens next with Salvo and Reaper.