Comment Re:I guess, the 'banning' didn't work then (Score 1) 158
Without details it is not clear when Mach 12 happened.
Yup. Without details, the claim actually just doesn't even make any sense as I explained above.
I'm guessing there are translational problems with the reporting.
A consideration on why the rocket was used might be China does not have a plane that could launch the vehicle at the moment. I think a modified B-52 is used to launch the X planes but they have been doing it for decades.
They did, in fact, use B-52s.
However, a 747 or A380 would work as well, and those are most definitely available to them.
But then again, maybe all of that is more of a pain in the ass than just doing a vertical launch.... But there's also simply the possibility that this test has no real analogue to the X planes, and is more akin to something like a... ballistically deployed cruise missile... for whatever reason you'd want such a thing.
The thing I keep getting caught up on is the terminology used in the reporting- ramjet.
Ramjets are not, and cannot operate at hypersonic regimes.
The combustion chamber must be subsonic, meaning with all of the tricks we know to move the speed envelope up they simply do not operate past Mach 5 or 6. For that, you need scramjets. Translation error, or indication that this is just a fart noise?
Wish we had more info.