What is the difference between hypersonic and supersonic

Recent reports of successful hypersonic missile tests demonstrate that these capabilities will be fielded much sooner than we thought, forcing a global re-assessment of traditional deterrence models. Defence iQ contributor and speaker at our upcoming Hypersonic Weapons Sytems online conference Dr James Bosbotinis , a UK-based specialist in defence and international affairs, has provided some technical and political insights into hypersonics, and the implications for future defence alliances.

A hypersonic missile travels at speeds of Mach 5 and higher - five times faster than the speed of sound mph , which is around 1 mile per second. Check out the video below for a more detailed look at the different types of hypersonic missile.

When hypersonic missiles become operational, the gap between missile defence systems and missile offence will be huge. Simply put, there is no single operational missile defence system that is capable of intercepting a hypersonic missile. Hypersonic missile research and development remains at the classified level, however in recent months many governments have announced successful tests and future projects.

This will be the case where a major regional power, such as Russia, may seek to coerce a neighbour, leveraging the threat of hypersonic strikes against critical targets. As such, the proliferation of hypersonic capabilities to regional states could also be destabilising, upsetting local balances of power. However, it could also strengthen deterrence". This concerns dual-capable systems, that is, systems with both conventional and nuclear capabilities, for example, the Kinzhal.

In the context of hypersonic threats, this is compounded by the reduced time available to decision-makers to respond to an incoming threat. Moreover, the development of submarine-launched hypersonic missiles would raise the potential threat — real or perceived — of attempted decapitation strikes, utilising the combination of the inherent stealth of a nuclear-powered submarine and the speed of a hypersonic missile. With regards to current US projects, Bosbotinis notes that the US has not focused to the same extent as Russia and China on the operational deployment of hypersonic capabilities.

Russia and China will have the capability the hit carrier groups with hypersonic missiles before they can get in operational range to launch airstrikes, as the upcoming F stealth fighter jets have a combat radius of miles, meanwhile hypersonic missiles potentially have a range in excess of 1, miles. Current supersonic missiles, such as BrahMos, have a range of around miles, but this can be increased with glide vehicles, meaning that carriers will have to move dangerously close to hostile territory to be effective.

Since , the Royal Navy and the French Navy have also been co-developing a hypersonic missile designed to replace the ageing Harpoon and Exocet, respectively. The missile, Perseus, is expected to feature an agile and stealthy airframe that is powered by a ramjet motor built around a high compact Continuous Detonation Wave Engine.

It is expected to come into service around China has a number of ongoing hypersonic projects. The nation is reportedly close to deploying a ballistic missile-launched hypersonic glide vehicle, the DF and has publicly exhibited a scramjet-powered missile, the Ling Yun.

Chinese operational doctrine calls for a weapon that would ward of US carrier groups, keeping them out of their operational range. The DF-ZF is a short to mid-range hypersonic missile glide vehicle and — when operational — would be able to largely mitigate any potential threat stemming from US carrier groups, fulfilling a long-term strategic goal without having to compete through naval strength.

In addition, China has also allegedly performed successful tests of the Starry Sky-2 hypersonic vehicle. The Starry Sky-2 can achieve a top speed of Mach 6 mph , switch direction mid-flight and can carry a payload consisting of either conventional warheads or nuclear weapons.

It will likely take China another five years to make the weapon operational. Russian doctrine calls for short and long-range capability, as the Kremlin will have to contend with European NATO members as well as the US on the other side of the Atlantic. In addition, Russia has deployed an operational hypersonic system, the KhM2 Kinzhal air-launched ballistic missile, capable reportedly of attaining a speed of Mach 10 and a range of miles, and is believed to be close to deploying a hypersonic cruise missile, the 3K22 Tsirkon.

The Tsirkon, a sea-and ground-launched missile is intended to attain high supersonic to hypersonic speeds, between Mach 4. Russia has also developed an intercontinental ballistic missile-launched hypersonic glide vehicle, Avangard, which may enter service in Hypersonic speeds have been achieved before, most notably by the U. Knight set the record for fastest crewed flight in when he piloted the North American X to Mach 6.

The top speed of military aircraft like the SR is estimated and unsurprisingly classified, with officials saying only that it will be able to hit at least the minimum hypersonic speed of Mach 5, so we'll use that as our baseline. And even though the speed of sound varies based on altitude and temperature, we'll set it to a fixed miles per hour, which is what you would expect at a cruising altitude of 40, feet and temperature of degrees Fahrenheit.

This is napkin math, after all. This is admittedly a simple, silly, and theoretical exercise—one that ignores not only large swaths of physics the time it would take to get up to speed, most egregiously but also gigantic practical engineering concerns like the max duration of sustained high-speed flight and the fuel requirements to get up to and stay at those hypersonic speeds.

Still, considering how profoundly hard it is to practically imagine things moving at such ridiculously high speeds, abstractions like this can be a helpful tool in wrapping your mind at least halfway around the sheer magnitude of the velocities at play. You probably won't ever know what it's like to travel Mach 5, and maybe you can't even adequately imagine it, but at the very least this should help us all appreciate the borderline suicidal bravery it takes to hop behind the stick of something that promises to scream up to hypersonic and beyond.

Hypersonic is one of three rough classifications for airflow regimes - subsonic less than Mach 0. By comparison, a Space Shuttle in orbit travels at about Mach The fastest conventional planes, such as the SR Blackbird, reach flight speeds of about Mach 3. Scramjets, of which there has been only a few successful demonstrations thus far, combust fuel using a supersonic intake valve, reaching speeds around Mach 7.

In its most recent test, HyShot reached Mach 8.