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--- transportation:stratolaunch [2023/12/07 01:57] – [Articles] timb
+++ transportation:stratolaunch [2025/05/09 07:03] (current) – [Articles] timb
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 https://www.theregister.com/2023/12/06/stratolaunch_hypersonic_craft/
+== After coming back from the dead, the world’s largest aircraft just flew a real payload ==
+Falling just short of hypersonic velocity.
+Eric Berger - 3/11/2024, 8:27 AM
+Built and flown by Stratolaunch, the massive Roc aircraft took off from Mojave Air and Space Port in California on Saturday. The airplane flew out over the Pacific Ocean, where it deployed the Talon-A vehicle, which looks something like a mini space shuttle.
+This marked the first time this gargantuan airplane released an honest-to-goodness payload, the first Talon-A vehicle, TA-1, which is intended to fly at hypersonic speed. During the flight, TA-1 didn't quite reach hypersonic velocity, which begins at Mach 5, or five times greater than the speed of sound.
+"While I can’t share the specific altitude and speed TA-1 reached due to proprietary agreements with our customers, we are pleased to share that in addition to meeting all primary and customer objectives of the flight, we reached high supersonic speeds approaching Mach 5 and collected a great amount of data at an incredible value to our customers," said Zachary Krevor, chief executive of Stratolaunch, in a statement.
+In essence, the TA-1 vehicle is a pathfinder for subsequent versions of the vehicle that will be both reusable and capable of reaching hypersonic speeds. The flight of the company's next vehicle, TA-2, could come later this year, Krevor said.
+https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/03/after-coming-back-from-the-dead-the-worlds-largest-aircraft-just-flew-a-real-payload/
+== World's Largest Aircraft Goes Supersonic In First Powered Flight ==
+Posted by BeauHD on Tuesday March 12, 2024 06:00AM
+An anonymous reader quotes a report from GeekWire:
+<blockquote>
+Chalk up another milestone for Stratolaunch, the air-launch venture created by the late Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen: The company's mammoth airplane deployed a winged test vehicle for its first rocket-powered flight. Stratolaunch's single-use TA-1 test vehicle blazed a trail for future reusable hypersonic test vehicles that are expected to help the U.S. military catch up on one of the frontiers of aerial combat. TA-1 went supersonic, according to Zachary Krevor, Stratolaunch's president and CEO -- but based on his comments, it may not have quite hit the hypersonic standard of five times the speed of sound. "While I can't share the specific altitude and speed TA-1 reached due to proprietary agreements with our customers, we are pleased to share that in addition to meeting all primary and customer objectives of the flight, we reached high supersonic speeds approaching Mach 5 and collected a great amount of data at an incredible value to our customers," Krevor said in a news release.
+</blockquote>
+https://tech.slashdot.org/story/24/03/12/038255/worlds-largest-aircraft-goes-supersonic-in-first-powered-flight
+==  The company with the world’s largest aircraft now has a hypersonic rocket plane ==
+"Hypersonic systems are now pushing the envelope beyond what can be done by the human body."
+Stephen Clark – May 6, 2025 1:46 PM
+Stratolaunch has finally found a use for the world's largest airplane.
+Twice in the last five months, the company launched a hypersonic vehicle over the Pacific Ocean, accelerated it to more than five times the speed of sound, and autonomously landed at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. Stratolaunch used the same vehicle for both flights.
+This is the first time anyone in the United States has flown a reusable hypersonic rocket plane since the last flight of the X-15, the iconic rocket-powered aircraft that pushed the envelope of high-altitude, high-speed flight 60 years ago.
+Stratolaunch announced the results of its two most recent test flights Monday. In December and again in March, Stratolaunch's Talon-A2 rocket plane launched from the belly of an enormous carrier aircraft over the Pacific Ocean and flew several hundred miles to Vandenberg, a military spaceport about 140 miles northwest of Los Angeles. There, the aircraft touched down on a concrete runway that NASA and the Air Force once considered for Space Shuttle landings.
+https://arstechnica.com/space/2025/05/stratolaunch-successfully-flies-a-modern-replacement-for-the-x-15-rocket-plane/