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Mach 9.6!!!!
NASA 'scramjet' makes historic hypersonic flight off California
A tiny unmanned NASA "scramjet" soared above the Pacific Ocean Tuesday at nearly 10 times the speed of sound, or almost 7,000 mph, in a record-breaking demonstration of a radical new engine technology.
The 12-foot-long X-43A supersonic combustion ramjet flew at about Mach 9.6 or slightly higher, said research engineer Randy Voland, leader of the scramjet propulsion team, during a post-flight press conference at NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center on Edwards Air Force Base.
The exotic aircraft flew under its own power for about 10 seconds after separating from a booster rocket at 111,000 feet, then glided to a splash landing about 800 miles offshore. Analysis of data to determine the exact performance will take several months, but mission officials were jubilant.
"Once again we made aviation history -- we did that in March when we went seven times the speed of sound and now we've done it right around 10 times the speed of sound," said Vince Rausch, Hyper-X program manager from NASA's Langley Research Center in Virginia.
"It was an absolutely tremendous experience," said Griff Corpening, chief engineer on two previous X-43A flights. "The research vehicle was absolutely rock-solid stable. Fuel came on as expected and off. All indications now we had a successful experiment."
The X-43A, mounted on a Pegasus rocket used to boost it to flight speed, was carried aloft under the wing of a B-52 aircraft and released at an altitude of 40,000 feet over a test range off the Southern California coast. The rocket motor then fired for a 90-second ascent.
Wow. This is an important step on the quest to lower the cost of getting things into orbit. A scramjet/rocket combo would be a good resuable ground-to-orbit option.
A tiny unmanned NASA "scramjet" soared above the Pacific Ocean Tuesday at nearly 10 times the speed of sound, or almost 7,000 mph, in a record-breaking demonstration of a radical new engine technology.
The 12-foot-long X-43A supersonic combustion ramjet flew at about Mach 9.6 or slightly higher, said research engineer Randy Voland, leader of the scramjet propulsion team, during a post-flight press conference at NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center on Edwards Air Force Base.
The exotic aircraft flew under its own power for about 10 seconds after separating from a booster rocket at 111,000 feet, then glided to a splash landing about 800 miles offshore. Analysis of data to determine the exact performance will take several months, but mission officials were jubilant.
"Once again we made aviation history -- we did that in March when we went seven times the speed of sound and now we've done it right around 10 times the speed of sound," said Vince Rausch, Hyper-X program manager from NASA's Langley Research Center in Virginia.
"It was an absolutely tremendous experience," said Griff Corpening, chief engineer on two previous X-43A flights. "The research vehicle was absolutely rock-solid stable. Fuel came on as expected and off. All indications now we had a successful experiment."
The X-43A, mounted on a Pegasus rocket used to boost it to flight speed, was carried aloft under the wing of a B-52 aircraft and released at an altitude of 40,000 feet over a test range off the Southern California coast. The rocket motor then fired for a 90-second ascent.
Wow. This is an important step on the quest to lower the cost of getting things into orbit. A scramjet/rocket combo would be a good resuable ground-to-orbit option.
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