Rocket-Airplane Will Fly Mach 20 Today

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A Rocket-Airplane Will Fly Mach 20 Today, But Won't Be Taking Passengers

August 10, 2011 at 8:56 AM | by JetSetCD | Comments (0)

http://www.jaunted.com/files/6193/Falconzoom1.jpg
The space race is way over, and sadly so is the entire NASA Space Shuttle program as well. But just because we aren't shipping astronauts up into orbit anymore doesn't mean the US isn't playing around still in outer space. Today actually marks the second test launch of a strange form of airplane-slash-rocket: the Falcon Hypersonic Technology Vehicle 2 (FTVH2). Capable of cruising at over 13,000mph (that's Mach 20 or 20x the speed of sound), the unmanned FTVH2 isn't a new travel or research toy, but a military one.
Around 7am PDT, an 8-story Minotaur IV rocket will shoot into the skies from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. Inside of it waits the Falcon, until, as International Business Times reports:

The rocket will puncture the atmosphere and releases FTVH2. Then the super-fast weapon will glide over the Pacific Ocean at nearly 20 times the speed of sound. The test flight will last 30 minutes before the FHTV2 hit the water and sink near the Kwajalein Atoll, about 4,100 miles from the Vandenberg Air Force Base. If the aircraft can complete its 30 minute flight, the project will continue otherwise the project will be shelved indefinitely.

http://www.jaunted.com/files/6193/Falconzoom2.jpg
They've already tried this once, believe it or not. In April 2010 the US Air Force together with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) test-launched one of these babies, but lost contact with it almost immediately. So now, over a year later, they've built another and are giving it a second go.
We shudder to think of how much this project has cost, and how if today's flight fails then all of that government green will have been for naught. Of course there's no exact figures released on the $$$ behind the Falcon, but good old Wikipedia notes that "According to Henry F. Cooper, who was the Director of the Strategic Defense Initiative (Star Wars) under President Reagan, spaceplane projects swallowed $4 billion in the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s (excluding the Space Shuttle)," and that the Falcon was "allocated a US$170 million for budget year 2008." Shudder! Sorry but we're not interested in any plane going Mach 20 unless there's the possibility of us getting to ride in it one day. Case closed.

Hope it doesn't go to far off course...

Quote:

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The rocket will puncture the atmosphere and releases FTVH2. Then the super-fast weapon will glide over the Pacific Ocean at nearly 20 times the speed of sound. The test flight will last 30 minutes before the FHTV2 hit the water and sink near the Kwajalein Atoll...

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China's submersible completes fifth dive test in Pacific Ocean

Global Times | August 03, 2011 02:10 By Xinhua

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China's manned submersible Jiaolong recently completed its fifth dive test in the Pacific Ocean, during which it reached a depth of 5,180 meters, the State Oceanic Administration said on Tuesday.

The administration said that Monday's dive saw the submersible conducting a series of undersea missions, including collecting sediment and microbe samples.

The Jiaolong has conducted four complete dives in the Pacific Ocean since July 21, reaching 5,188 meters during its deepest dive, according to the administration.

The Jiaolong, designed to reach a maximum depth of 7,000 meters, completed 17 dives in the South China Sea between May 31 and July 18 last year, reaching 3,759 meters during its deepest dive.

China is the fifth country to send a man 3,500 meters below sea level, following the US, France, Russia and Japan.

What super power is most likely to challenge Taiwan, South Korea, Japan and America in the Pacific?

Answer: China

Who hacks, steals, and copies every new piece of military hardware they put their mitts on?

Answer: China

If some new US classified super fast black project craft splashed into the pacific ocean which super power would most likely want to get their hands on it?

A. Italy
B. China
C. Russia
D. China and Russia

A. Italy.

I think Peterle is the spy and he knows how to do it.

I suspect he is actually Goldfinger that Mr. Bond was after.

I was being funny, of course. However, I think it would be China... IF the following wasn't going to happen:

Quote:

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The test flight will last 30 minutes before the FHTV2 hit the water and sink near the Kwajalein Atoll

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I'd point out that the particular atoll herein mentioned is not only patrolled by Naval vessels, we have a lot more "stuff" there than you might care to think about. The US Government owns that island, such as it is, and there are military ships (Navy) there, as well as over flights, part of the MDA sits there, and we will KNOW if there are subs near by,

I was being funny, of course. However, I think it would be China... IF the following wasn't going to happen:

Quote:

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The test flight will last 30 minutes before the FHTV2 hit the water and sink near the Kwajalein Atoll

---

I'd point out that the particular atoll herein mentioned is not only patrolled by Naval vessels, we have a lot more "stuff" there than you might care to think about. The US Government owns that island, such as it is, and there are military ships (Navy) there, as well as over flights, part of the MDA sits there, and we will KNOW if there are subs near by,

I wonder if this machine uses pulse-jet technology? 20Mach is PDF, pretty damn fast!

Well... it flew.

And they lost it.

It's gone.

Missing.

Just... vanished.


(Personally, I suspect it warped out to another time line)

Technology

The business and culture of our digital lives,
from the L.A. Times


Test of hypersonic aircraft fails over Pacific Ocean

August 11, 2011 | 10:11 am
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/.a/6...a828970b-600wi
A test flight of an experimental aircraft capable of speeding through air at 20 times the speed of sound ended prematurely Thursday morning when the arrowhead-shaped plane stopped sending back real-time data to engineers and scientists who were moderating the mission.


In the test flight, the aircraft, known as the Falcon Hypersonic Technology Vehicle 2, was launched at 7:45 a.m. from Vandenberg, located northwest of Santa Barbara, into the upper reaches of Earth's http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/.a/6...e6d5970d-320wi atmosphere aboard an eight-story Minotaur IV rocket, made by Orbital Sciences Corp.


After reaching an undisclosed sub-orbital altitude, the aircraft jettisoned from its protective cover atop the rocket, then nose-dived back toward Earth, leveled out and was supposed to glide above the Pacific at 20 times the speed of sound, or Mach 20.


The plan was for the Falcon to speed westward for 30 minutes before plunging into the ocean near Kwajalein Atoll, about 4,000 miles from Vandenberg.


But about 20 minutes into the mission, the Pentagon’s research arm, known as Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, announced on its Twitter account that: “Range assets have lost telemetry.”


It sounds eerily similar to the problems that plagued the Falcon’s first flight, which took place in April 2010. That test flight ended prematurely with only nine minutes of flight time. Engineers went back to the drawing board and were believed to have had things ironed out.


If you have visions of this thing headed back to your house, DARPA sent out another tweet with the reassurance that the Falcon "has an autonomous flight termination capability," which likely means it ditched itself into the Pacific.


More information will be forthcoming. Look on latimes.com for updates.
RELATED:

-- W.J. Hennigan

Test of hypersonic aircraft fails over Pacific Ocean

August 11, 2011 | 10:11 am

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/.a/6...ce00970c-640wi

A test flight of an experimental aircraft capable of speeding through air at 20 times the speed of sound ended prematurely Thursday morning when the arrowhead-shaped plane failed and stopped sending back real-time data to engineers and scientists who were moderating the mission.

In the test flight, the aircraft, known as the Falcon Hypersonic Technology Vehicle 2, was launched at 7:45 a.m. from Vandenberg Air Force Base, located northwest of Santa Barbara, into the upper reaches of Earth's atmosphere aboard an eight-story Minotaur IV rocket, made by Orbital Sciences Corp.

After reaching an undisclosed sub-orbital altitude, the aircraft jettisoned from its protective cover atop the rocket, then nose-dived back toward Earth, leveled out and was supposed to glide above the Pacific at 20 times the speed of sound, or Mach 20.

The plan was for the Falcon to speed westward for 30 minutes before plunging into the ocean near Kwajalein Atoll, about 4,000 miles from Vandenberg.

But about 20 minutes into the mission, the Pentagon’s research arm, known as Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, announced on its Twitter account that: “Range assets have lost telemetry.”

It sounds eerily similar to the problems that plagued the Falcon’s first flight, which took place in April 2010. That test flight ended prematurely with only nine minutes of flight time. Engineers went back to the drawing board and were believed to have had things ironed out.

If you have visions of this thing headed back to your house, DARPA sent out another tweet with the reassurance that the Falcon "has an autonomous flight termination capability," which likely means it ditched itself into the Pacific.

• August 11, 2011, 2:11 PM ET

Sinking Feeling: Pentagon’s Mach 20 Craft Drops Out of Sight

What flies at 13,000 miles per hour, can withstand temperatures of 3,500 degrees Fahrenheit, and, apparently, is very hard to spot? The Falcon Hypersonic Technology Vehicle 2, or HTV-2, an unmanned aircraft that was launched Thursday by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.

http://s.wsj.net/public/resources/im...0810110239.jpg

Department of Defense Image

Around 10:45 a.m. EDT, an Air Force Minotaur IV rocket lifted off from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., carrying the HTV-2, a rocket-launched aircraft that is supposed to test the limits of hypersonic flight, reaching speeds of up to Mach 20.

Shortly after liftoff, all seemed to be going to plan. The agency’s Twitter feed posted this message: “Confirmation of a successful #HTV2 separation from the Minotaur IV launch vehicle.”

That meant the HVT2 was on track, and about to begin its hypersonic glide across the Pacific. A few minutes later, another, less optimistic message popped up on Twitter: “Range assets have lost telemetry with #HTV2.

More to follow.”

As of around 1:30 p.m. in Washington, DARPA had not provided additional updates on the success of the mission, which is supposed to help improve the understanding of how to control and maintain communication with an aircraft that reaches speeds of up to 3.6 miles per second.

The latest message from the agency states: “Downrange assets did not reacquire tracking or telemetry. #HTV2 has an autonomous flight termination capability. More to follow.”

Termination of the flight is not necessarily considered a failure. During a test last year, researchers lost contact with the HTV-2 nine minutes after launch. But the agency said the flight yielded valuable data, including 139 seconds of data on extremely high-speed flight, ranging from Mach 17 to Mach 22.

Today’s flight — it was postponed on Wednesday due to weather –was the second of a series of planned flights for the exotic aircraft, which is supposed to help develop the concept of “prompt global strike” – the military’s ability to hit a target, on short notice, anywhere on the globe.

DARPA did not immediately respond to a request for additional comment.

August 11, 2011 12:24 PM

Mach 20 test goes awry, military craft lost

By Tariq Malik

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After launching on a rocket, DARPA's Falcon Hypersonic Technology Vehicle prototype reaches suborbital space and then re-enters Earth's atmosphere at speeds of about Mach 20 (DARPA)

(Space.com)

(Update: 1:06 p.m. EDT)The U.S. military lost contact with an unmanned hypersonic glider shortly after it launched on a test flight today (Aug. 12) as part of a global strike weapons program to develop vehicles capable of flying at Mach 20 and reach any target in the world in an hour.

The DARPA glider, called the Falcon Hypersonic Test Vehicle 2 (HTV-2), blasted off from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California atop a Minotaur 4 rocket at 7:45 a.m. PDT.

According to DARPA updates, the test flight appeared to go well until the glide phase, when monitoring stations lost contact with the HTV-2 vehicle. [Photos: DARPA Hypersonic Glider's Mach 20 Test]
"Range assets have lost telemetry with HTV2," DARPA officials wrote in a Twitter post about 36 minutes after launch.

Monitoring stations further down range of the vehicle's flight path over the Pacific Ocean also did not find the hypersonic HTV-2 glider. The vehicle is designed to crash itself into the ocean at the end of its mission.

"Downrange assets did not reacquire tracking or telemetry. HTV2 has an autonomous flight termination capability," DARPA officials wrote.
Whether the test flight met all of its objecties still remains unclear, but this is the second test flight of the Falcon HTV--2 program that ended prematurely. An April 2010 test flight ended nine minutes into flight, also due to loss of contact.

The HTV-2 vehicle was expected to reach suborbital space, then re-enter Earth's atmosphere and glide at hypersonic speed to demonstrate controllable flight at velocities of around Mach 20, which is about 13,000 mph. At that speed, more than 20 times the speed of sound, a vehicle could fly from New York City to Los Angeles in 12 minutes, DARPA officials said.

A video animation of the HTV-2 flight test depicts how the the hypersonic vehicle was expected to pop free of its rocket, then soar through Earth's atmosphere for an inevitable, and intentional, plunge into the Pacific Ocean at the end of its mission.



"Assumptions about Mach 20 hypersonic flight were made from physics-based computational models and simulations, wind tunnel testing, and data collected from HTV-2's first test flight -- the first real data available in this flight regime at Mach 20," said Air Force Maj. Chris Schulz, HTV-2 program manager, in a statement. "It's time to conduct another flight test to validate our assumptions and gain further insight into extremely high Mach regimes that we cannot fully replicate on the ground."

The HTV-2 is part of a program called Prompt Global Strike called DARPA (which is short for Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) to develop advanced weapons systems with extreme range.

"The ultimate goal is a capability that can reach anywhere in the world in less than an hour." DARPA officials wrote in a mission description.

Today's launch is the second test flight for DARPA's Falcon HTV test program. An April 2010 launch lasted only nine minutes, when DARPA lost contact with its HTV-1 vehicle shortly after it separated from its rocket booster. The HTV vehicles were built for DARPA by Lockheed Martin Corp.

"The HTV-2 vehicle is a 'data truck' with numerous sensors that collect data in an uncertain operating envelope," DARPA stated in a mission description.

How the hypersonic HTV-2 should fly

For today's hypersonic flight test, the HTV-2 vehicle was expected to launch into suborbital space, separate from its Orbital Sciences Corp.-built Minotaur 4 rocket, then re-enter the atmosphere. During the re-entry phase, the vehicle was expected to use rocket thrusters to help maintain its course, according to a DARPA description.

After the re-entry maneuver, the HTV-2 was slated to enter a pull-up phase to control its speed and altitude ahead of the long glide back to Earth. During the glide, the vehicle is programmed to perform maneuvers to test aerodynamic performance, DARPA officials said.

The HTV-2 was expected to end its hypersonic test flight by performing a roll maneuver to intentionally crash into the Pacific Ocean. DARPA officials said more than 20 observing stations will monitor the entire flight from space, land, ships and aircraft.

Hypersonic tests in wind tunnels on the ground can typically recreate conditions at speeds only up to Mach 15, and only for a few milliseconds at a time, Schulz said.

"And even then we wouldn't know exactly what to expect based solely on the snapshots provided in ground testing," Schulz said. "Only flight testing reveals the harsh and uncertain reality."

Photos: Breaking the Sound Barrier
How DARPA's HTV-2 Hypersonic Bomber Test Works
10 Military Aircraft that Never Made it Past the Test Phase

I didnt read any of the above... been too busy helping my son move into a house.

But, both tests lasted EXACTLY 9 minutes. And both tests ended the same way.

I
m telling you those two craft are in the future someplace.

LOL


"1.21 gigawatts at Mach 20...."

U.S. Army to Test “Global Strike” Technology This Week

Monday, Nov. 14, 2011 By Martin Matishak
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON -- The U.S. Army on Wednesday will test missile technology that could eventually be incorporated into the development a conventional "prompt global strike" weapon, according to Defense Department officials (see GSN, Dec. 14, 2010).

http://gsn.nti.org/gsn/nw_20111114_8724_image_0.jpg
(Nov. 14) - The U.S. Army is expected to test on Wednesday a potential technology under development for conventional prompt global strike. Another experimental technology for the mission, the Hypersonic Technology Vehicle-2, is shown separating from a rocket in an artist's rendition (AP Photo/U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency).

Army Space and Missile Defense Command and Army Forces Strategic Command will conduct a flight test of the Advanced Hypersonic Weapon, which is to use an advanced-technology glide body built to endure high-speed flight in the upper atmosphere en route to a target.

"This test is designed to collect data on hypersonic boost-glide technologies and test-range performance for long-range atmospheric flight," Pentagon spokeswoman Lt. Col. Melinda Morgan told Global Security Newswire last week by e-mail.

She said the test scenario would focus on "flight performance of aerodynamics; navigation, guidance, and control; and thermal protection technologies."

The test vehicle is slated to be launched from the Pacific Missile Range Facility on the island of Kauai, Hawaii, and is to fly to the Ronald Reagan Ballistic Missile Defense Test Site, located more than 2,000 miles southwest on the Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands.

The launch had been slated to take place on Tuesday but was delayed one day "due to scheduling conflicts with other events in the Pacific," according to Morgan, who did not elaborate.

The data gleaned from the test will be used by the Defense Department to develop future capabilities for conventional prompt global strike, she told GSN.

The Pentagon is interested in developing a nonnuclear, prompt-strike capability to attack a target anywhere around the world with just an hour's notice. This type of weapon might be used in the event that U.S. naval vessels or land-based aircraft are not located close enough to strike a target under urgent conditions, such as prior to an impending North Korean missile launch.

AHW technologies, if proven successful, might be incorporated into the Air Force Conventional Strike Missile, which could be the first such prompt-attack capability to be fielded (see GSN, June 24).

Pentagon successfully tests hypersonic flying bomb

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AFP – Thu, Nov 17, 2011

The Pentagon on Thursday held a successful test flight of a flying bomb that travels faster than the speed of sound and will give military planners the ability to strike targets anywhere in the world in less than a hour.

Launched by rocket from Hawaii at 1130 GMT, the "Advanced Hypersonic Weapon," or AHW, glided through the upper atmosphere over the Pacific "at hypersonic speed" before hitting its target on the Kwajalein atoll in the Marshall Islands, a Pentagon statement said.

Kwajalein is about 2,500 miles (4,000 kilometers) southwest of Hawaii. The Pentagon did not say what top speeds were reached by the vehicle, which unlike a ballistic missile is maneuverable.

Scientists classify hypersonic speeds as those that exceed Mach 5 -- or five times the speed of sound -- 3,728 miles (6,000 kilometers) an hour.

The test aimed to gather data on "aerodynamics, navigation, guidance and control, and thermal protection technologies," said Lieutenant Colonel Melinda Morgan, a Pentagon spokeswoman.

The US Army's AHW project is part of the "Prompt Global Strike" program which seeks to give the US military the means to deliver conventional weapons anywhere in the world within an hour.

On August 11, the Pentagon test flew another hypersonic glider dubbed HTV-2, which is capable of flying 27,000 kilometers per hour, but it was a failure.

The AHW's range is less than that of the HTV-2, the Congressional Research Service said in a report, without providing specifics.

The Pentagon has invested 239.9 million dollars in the Global Strike program this year, including 69 million for the flying bomb tested Thursday, CRS said.

Kind of dumb... "faster than the speed of sound".

Seems to me that missiles fly at as much as mach 4 or something, which is well beyond the speed of sound.

I think that is piss poor reporting.