Stratolaunch conducts ‘captive carry’ test flight of hypersonic vehicle

Private U.S. company Stratolaunch conducted its second “captive carry” test flight of what it hopes will become a reusable hypersonic vehicle, it said on Saturday, as the Pentagon presses ahead with development of new hypersonic weapons.
The Stratolaunch Talon-A was loaded with live propellant and carried aloft by the Spirit of Mojave, a modified Boeing 747-400 with dual fuselages, on a more than four-hour flight going over the Pacific Ocean.
During a captive carry test, the payload craft does not separate from the carrier aircraft.
The vehicle will be used to carry hypersonic weapons systems during their development. Component makers could test engines, sensors and communications equipment aboard future reusable versions of the Talon-A.
The U.S. and its global rivals are speeding up work on hypersonic weapons, the next generation of arms that rob adversaries of reaction time and can evade traditional defense mechanisms.