Hermeus unveiled its new high-speed, jet-powered Quarterhorse Mk 1 aircraft today, taking another small step toward the Atlanta-based startup’s goal of producing the world’s first reusable hypersonic plane.
The uncrewed Mk 1 aircraft is set to become the first Hermeus-produced aircraft to take to the skies during flight tests at Edwards Air Force base scheduled later this year, which are aimed at proving it can safely conduct high-speed take off and landings.
Hermeus ultimately seeks to build two types of mass-produced hypersonic aircraft: a multi-mission drone for the defense market called Darkhorse and a passenger plane known as Halcyon capable of flying from New York to London in 90 minutes.
But for now, as the company debuts the Quarterhorse Mk 1, it also intends to pitch the next iteration of the Quarterhorse, a faster supersonic Mk 2 version set to roll out in 2025, to the Pentagon as its first product.
“We’re building a capability that certainly fill some gaps, and I think having an operational capability earlier than Darkhorse — like a couple years earlier — really helps [the Pentagon],” said Hermeus founder and CEO AJ Piplica in an interview with Breaking Defense.
Piplica declined to comment on whether Hermeus will propose the Quarterhorse Mk 2 for the Pentagon’s Replicator program, which is seeking to field thousands of unmanned systems over two years, or the Air Force’s collaborative combat aircraft program that aims to build autonomous drone wingmen that fighter pilots will command. (Hermeus is not among the first five primes participating in the early stages of the Air Force’s collaborative combat aircraft project.)
However, Hermeus views the Quarterhorse Mk 2 — billed by the company as “the world’s first purpose-built high-Mach drone” — as a unique offering among the systems currently operated by the United States military like the RQ-4 Global Hawk and MQ-9 Reaper, which operate at subsonic speeds.
Hermeus’s foray into high-speed unmanned aircraft isn’t the only one. Recently, fellow startup Anduril unveiled a high subsonic rocket-powered platform to act as an air defense system, and higher-flying Stratolaunch plans to conduct its own test flight of a recoverable hypersonic vehicle later this year.
According to breakingdefense.com. Source of photo: internet
