Greetings,
I was considering asking hudson/ pennywise's permissions to use whatever drop command they used for the F/A 18 to make a universal sound barrier script (that works with all other planes). The script would detect if the plane that it was executed on was the F/A 18, and disable the drop effect. The script also fades the sound down if the player is on board the plane (except for voice), making the whole faster than sound thing more realistic.
I actually created the script a while back, but never got around to asking permissions, so it hasn't been published.
As for the chopper handling, the lack of air at that altitude would mean that the heli blades would not be able to provide any lift. And, yes, the engine intakes would not work either
. A helicopter would start to lose altitude far below 100,000 feet, anyway, so you wouldn't really be able to find out...
-Supreme Commander PsyWarrior
-Psychic Productions