Hypersonic Test Aircraft Peeled Apart After 3 Minutes of Sustained Mach 20 Speed

coondoggie writes "DARPA's experimental Hypersonic Technology Vehicle (HTV-2), lost significant portions of its outer skin and became uncontrollable after three minutes of sustained Mach 20 speed last August. That was the conclusion of an independent engineering review board investigating the cause of what DARPA calls a 'flight anomaly' in the second test flight of the HTV-2. Quoting the report: 'The resulting gaps created strong, impulsive shock waves around the vehicle as it traveled nearly 13,000 miles per hour, causing the vehicle to roll abruptly. Based on knowledge gained from the first flight in 2010 and incorporated into the second flight, the vehicle's aerodynamic stability allowed it to right itself successfully after several shockwave-induced rolls. Eventually, however, the severity of the continued disturbances finally exceeded the vehicle's ability to recover.'"

Comments

Expert opinion

[Anonymous Coward]

As a person who flies hypersonic aircraft for a living this is notable on several layers.

1. They did a test and it went far past hypersonic (M5).

2. They achieved M20, altitude adjusted

3. All that happened after 3 minutes is the materials failed

4. It lasted 3 minutes!

To me this is a stupendous success.

I am a hyper-critic of most of the hypersonic tests we all hear about.

Spend more money on this.

JJ

Re:scientifically

[zippthorne]

If you can go that fast in an atmosphere, you can use an air-breathing engine to get you most of the way to LEO...