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Stephen Chen

Chinese scientists have sent a hypersonic aircraft with a remarkably bulky body soaring through the sky, reaching a speed that could cover the distance from Beijing to New York in two hours.
During a 2021 test flight first widely publicised this week, a scaled-down prototype of the aircraft reached a top speed of Mach 6.56 – or over six times the speed of sound.
The test has provided early validation of a design that, when first unveiled six years ago, was thought to be impossible.
“At the time, everyone thought it was a crazy idea,” said Cui Kai, the project’s leader and a researcher at the Institute of Mechanics under the Chinese Academy of Sciences, speaking in Beijing in October.
“We faced almost universal scepticism. Fortunately, we chose to persevere. I always believed that innovation thrives amid doubt.”
The aircraft marks a significant departure from the slender hypersonic vehicles previously seen. It features a fat and round fuselage and cape-shaped wings on its back.
This means that in the future, hypersonic aircraft could carry just as many passengers or as much cargo as today’s jumbo jets.

After a decade of work on the aircraft, Cui’s team secured permission for a test flight at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in the Gobi Desert of northwest China in August 2021.
“The moment I saw that small aircraft soar into the sky, the sense of achievement and pride was truly indescribable,” Cui said.
The nearly 20-minute test flight, which could prove to be a historic milestone in human aviation, addresses a long-standing challenge for aircraft designers: as flight speed increases, the usable space within the cabin decreases.
This is why an adult passenger could easily bump their head when standing in the legendary Concorde supersonic airliner.
All hypersonic aircraft now capable of flying at speeds above Mach 5 have severely limited internal space, restricting their use to military applications such as missiles and unmanned reconnaissance aircraft.
At high speeds, the front of a large airframe experiences significant downward pressure, impairing its climbing ability.
Cui added a broad wing surface above the airframe to convert this downward pressure into upward lift, effectively turning a drawback into an advantage.
However, this resulted in a design that was unprecedentedly complex. After unveiling the concept to the public in 2018, Cui’s team continued to refine the design and conduct extensive wind tunnel tests.
Cui noted that each test required an investment of hundreds of thousands of yuan. The tests were conducted several times to validate the feasibility of various models, paving the way for the successful test flight.
Due to the technical sensitivity of the project, the test flight was kept under wraps for three years. The Chinese Academy of Sciences released Cui’s speech on social media on Tuesday, along with a video of the prototype’s lift-off.
Cui did not disclose the status of construction on the full-scale aircraft or its expected first flight date.
“For such cutting-edge technology, we still face numerous challenges that need to be addressed directly, including issues related to power, materials and structure,” Cui said.
“We have only completed a small fraction of the work and taken a modest step forward.”
Nonetheless, the team’s efforts could help revolutionise human transport, turning the concept of “one-hour global travel” from science fiction into reality.
“This will be a significant leap forward,” he said.


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Science

China’s hypersonic jumbo jet prototype hits Mach 6 in Gobi Desert test flight

Video footage released this week shows the prototype’s 2021 test flight, which had been kept under wraps for years because of the sensitivity of the project. Photo: Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences

The aircraft features a “fat and round” fuselage and cape-shaped wings on its back. Photo: Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences

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The Chinese Journal of Aeronautics shows how the Tsinghua University team’s RRDE works. Photo: CJA journal

Typical structures of RRDE. Credit: Wang Bing

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Anti-stealth radar, such as this one at a Chinese air show, will be blind to aircraft and weapons coated with a newly developed stealth material made by Chinese scientists. Photo: Dickson Lee

The new coating uses a metal circuit to convert electromagnetic waves into heat, and effectively blinds anti-stealth radar. Photo: National University of Defence Technology

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The J-35A stealth fighter jet is headed for duty on China’s aircraft carriers. Photo: Xinhua

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Visitors walk around models of J-35A (left) and J-20S (right) aircraft on display at the show. Photo: EPA-EFE

News

China

Chinese institute reveals test footage of aircraft that could help turn dream of ‘one-hour global travel’ into reality


Chinese institute reveals test footage of aircraft that could help turn dream of ‘one-hour global travel’ into reality.


Hypersonic flight

Aviation

Technology

China technology