Hypersonic missiles and space rockets already exist, but more test flights are needed before commercial airline passengers can be whisked around the world in a couple of hours.
Maxal Tamor/Shutterstock (with elements supplied by Nasa)
China has upped its defence spending and is investing heavily in revolutionary technologies that could transform its military into the world’s most powerful force by the middle of the century.
An impression of the X-51 Waverider, the US hypersonic aircraft programme.
NASA
On September 18 this year, far above the Arctic Circle at Norway’s Andoya Rocket Range, the SCRAMSPACE hypersonic scramjet flight experiment was about to launch. Three and a half years of intense effort…
Hypersonic aircraft seem destined to enter the commercial market.
davekellam
Late last week the Defence Advanced Research Programs Agency (DARPA) in the USA launched a second flight of a craft called the HTV-2, designed to glide at Mach 20 while re-entering the earth’s atmosphere…