FARNBOROUGH, U.K. - The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency this week announced a second successful flight test of Raytheon Technologies’ Hypersonic Air-breathing Weapons Concept, Courtney Albon reports for Defense News. Continue reading original article.
The Military & Aerospace Electronics take:
22 July 2022 - During the flight test, after releasing HAWC from an aircraft and accelerating to hypersonic speeds using the scramjet engine, the vehicle flew a trajectory that engineers designed to intentionally stress the weapon concept to explore its limits and further validate digital performance models. These models, grounded in real-world flight data, are being used to accurately predict and increase performance as the system matures.
Scramjet engines use high vehicle speed to forcibly compress incoming air before combustion to enable sustained flight at hypersonic speeds – Mach 5 or greater. The system was designed to use a widely available hydrocarbon fuel, and since it uses air for combustion, it does not have to carry the added weight of an onboard oxidizer. These key attributes allow for a safe, efficient, and tactically sized, long-range hypersonic weapon. By traveling at these speeds, hypersonic weapons like HAWC can reach their targets more quickly than traditional missiles, allowing them to potentially evade defense systems.
Related: U.S. military moving forward on hypersonics
Jamie Whitney, Associate Editor
Intelligent Aerospace
