Steady shock/boundary layer interactions and self-sustained unsteady type IV shock-shock interference heating problems with nonequilibrium real gas effects were studied by numerical simulations. We emphasized the effects of internal thermochemical excitation on surface heating rates, skin friction, and flow-field unsteadiness of the viscous shock interactions. The multicomponent Navier-Stokes equations with nonequilibrium rotational, vibrational, and chemical models for five-species air were solved by a finite-volume second-order TVD scheme together with a new third-order semi-implicit Runge-Kutta scheme. For the steady shock/boundary layer interaction on a flat plate, it was found that the real gas effects reduce the size of the shock-induced separation bubble and the magnitude of the surface heating rates. Type-IV shock-shock interference heating flows with real gas effects are inherently unsteady to a degree related to the location of the jet impingement on the cylinder relative to the stagnation point. For certain impingement positions, vortices are generated and shed off near the jet impingement point. (Author)