In December, 2022, Leidos ($13.7B annual revenue fortune 500 company) was awarded a $334 million contract to assist the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) in developing an air-breathing hypersonic system. The Expendable Hypersonic Multi-mission ISR (intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance) and Strike program, better known as Mayhem, will span a 51-month period of performance. The initial task order is $24 million to conduct the System Requirements Review (SRR) and Conceptual Design Review (CoDR) in a Digital Engineering (DE) environment.
The goal of the Mayhem hypersonic program is to get five times the payload and twice the range of existing US hypersonic systems. This will ultimately lead to a hypersonic bomber in the price range of about $1 billion each. This would be about twice the price of the B-21 Stealth bomber.
The Mayhem system will use a scramjet engine to generate thrust, propelling the vehicle across long distances at speeds greater than Mach 5. Leidos is tasked with designing and developing a large-class version that surpasses current air-breathing systems in range and payload capacity using digital engineering to ensure the design efforts help future development and transition.
Leidos has assembled a team of leaders from industry and academia, including Calspan, Draper and Kratos Defense & Security Solutions, Inc., to serve as the System Design Agent (SDA).
The Lockheed Skunkworks team did work on the fictional Darkstar hypersonic bomber in the Top Gun Maverick movie. It is unknown how much real hypersonic research was put into the fictional Darkstar concept.
Brian Wang is a Futurist Thought Leader and a popular Science blogger with 1 million readers per month. His blog Nextbigfuture.com is ranked #1 Science News Blog. It covers many disruptive technology and trends including Space, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Medicine, Anti-aging Biotechnology, and Nanotechnology.
Known for identifying cutting edge technologies, he is currently a Co-Founder of a startup and fundraiser for high potential early-stage companies. He is the Head of Research for Allocations for deep technology investments and an Angel Investor at Space Angels.
A frequent speaker at corporations, he has been a TEDx speaker, a Singularity University speaker and guest at numerous interviews for radio and podcasts. He is open to public speaking and advising engagements.
What is even the point?
-They have terrible drag, so bad range.
-They stick out like crazy with their 1200°C leading edges (at Mach 5) and are incredibly loud that will alert anyone on the ground even when it’s dark or cloudy
-They are of dubious value for reconnaissance, with terrible thermal environment, extreme skin temperatures, severely hampered sensor covering options…
-It’s long been established that modern missiles have no trouble dealing with hypersonic targets. Especially at high altitude on fragile aeroshells where shrapnel has far larger effective range in <1% air pressure.
-They're extremely difficult and costly to develop, and would see little use. Likely $10's to 100's of million per flight including amortization of dev costs. In same ballpark as launching a satellite.
A ballistic overflight by a relatively simple reusable rocket like a scaled down Falcon 9 at 50-200km altitude would be far simpler and cheaper, harder to spot and hit (if stealthed), and can have much greater useful range as well. Mass produced low-altitude low-life reconnaissance satellites would be a better bet.