When you purchase through connection on our site , we may pull in an affiliate mission . Here ’s how it works .
The U.S. armed forces is reportedly developing a hypersonic jet planer that could soar at up to five times the speed of sound — faster than a bullet , which in general travels at Mach 2 , or twice the speed of sound .
The newhypersonic fomite , which could take flight by 2023 , builds upon enquiry from a 2013 tryout flight of an experimental hypersonic vehicle , the X-51A Waverider , according to Military.com .
This Air Force illustration depicts the X-51A Waverider scramjet vehicle during hypersonic flight during its 7 February 2025 test. Powered by a Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne SJY61 scramjet engine, it is designed to ride on its own shockwave and accelerate to about Mach 6.
The $ 300 million X-51A program begin in 2004 . The platform ’s final test flight of stairs occurred May 1 , 2013 , when the unmanned Waverider attain a top speed of Mach 5.1 ( more than five times the speed of phone ) in just over six minutes , before it was intentionally crash into the Pacific Ocean . At the fourth dimension , U.S. Air Force officials said the escape was the longest - ever for a hypersonic vehicle of its kind . [ fly Saucers to Mind Control : 7 Declassified Military & CIA Secrets ]
During the 2013 trial flight , the hypersonic jet was released from a B-52H Stratofortress at an altitude of 50,000 feet ( 15,000 metre ) . After separation , the Waverider accelerate to Mach 4.8 in just 26 seconds , powered by a square rocket booster . The hypersonic jet split up from the rocket at an altitude of 60,000 base ( 18,300 m ) , eventually arrive at Mach 5.1 with its air - breathe ultrasonic burning ramjet ( or scramjet ) engine .
" X-51 was really a validation of construct test . It showed that you could get a scram super C locomotive engine , launch it off an aircraft and it could go hypersonic , " Mica Endsley , the Air Force ’s chief scientist , told Military.com . " It was able-bodied to go more than Mach 5 until it ran out of fuel . It was a very successful test of an airborne hypersonic weapons system . "
But the military ’s next - propagation hypersonic vehicle will go even further , Endsley said . This time , engineers in the Air Force and the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency ( DARPA ) will take into account materials that can make for well at hypersonic speeds and guidance systems that are wise enough to point the sheet in the right direction quickly , she added .
DARPA is working on multiple projects to study thecapabilities of hypersonic trajectory . Several years ago , the way conducted hypersonic trial flights with an HTV-2 bomber ; in 2011 , the hero sandwich paradigm reached a top speed of Mach 20 before lose control . The Air Force has also say it is working on hypersonic weapon that could be go off from aircraft traveling at high speeds .
Additionally , in 2014 , DARPA foretell it would extend with itsExperimental Spaceplane ( XS-1 ) program , an initiative to develop a military space plane to launch small artificial satellite into orbit . Boeing , Masten Space Systems and Northrop Grumman were all awarded backing for the project , which DARPA functionary said could supply a understructure for future fleets of hypersonic vehicles .
