The Pentagon Says The United States Has Again Successfully Conducted Flight Tests Of Hypersonic Weapons, This Time Made By Raytheon

Illustrated by Raytheon. (Wikimedia Commons / David Monniaux)

JAKARTA - The United States has claimed to have successfully tested a hypersonic weapon from Raytheon Technologies Corp., which can travel faster than five times the speed of sound, making it the third successful test of the class of weapons since 2013, the US Department of Defense, the Pentagon, said in a statement on Thursday. Monday.

The Hypersonic Air-breathing Weapon Concept (HAWC) development program is being run by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA. Both Raytheon and Lockheed Martin Corp., are vying for the ultimate contract award.

Pressurized vehicles use air captured from the atmosphere to achieve continuous propulsion. Different types of propulsion work in a vacuum.

There have been four pressurized hypersonic weapons tests since September. Raytheon products have been successful twice. Meanwhile, Lockheed had one successful test and one failure.

"Advancing our nation's hypersonic capabilities is a critical national imperative, and it is an important step forward. Having successive successful flight tests gives us greater confidence in the technical maturity of our HAWC prototype," Wes Kremer, President of Business Unit Raytheon Missiles & Defence, launches Reuters July 19.

During a test flight, after removing the HAWC from the aircraft and accelerating to hypersonic speeds using a scramjet engine, Raytheon said in a statement.

"The vehicle flew on a trajectory designed by engineers to intentionally emphasize the weapon concept in order to explore its limits and further validate digital performance models."

This success marks the third successful test in a series of hypersonic weapons in various US programs under development.

This successful test comes after the June 29 failed test flight of a different type of hypersonic weapon, the Common Hypersonic Glide Body, at the Pacific Missile Range Facility in Hawaii.

The United States and its global rivals are increasing their pace to build hypersonic weapons – the next generation of weapons that robs the enemy of reaction time and traditional defeat mechanisms.

To note, hypersonic weapons travel in the upper atmosphere at speeds more than five times the speed of sound, or about 6,200 kilometers (3,853 miles) per hour.