Raytheon Awarded Contract for Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile Development
Raytheon, now operating as RTX, has been awarded a contract worth up to $985 million by the U.S. Air Force to develop and demonstrate prototypes for the Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile (HACM). This air-launched, scramjet-powered missile is designed to travel at speeds exceeding Mach 5. The HACM program originated from the U.S.-Australian Southern Cross Integrated Flight Research Experiment (SCIFiRE), which focused on air-breathing hypersonic cruise missile technology. Unlike boost-glide weapons that use a rocket to accelerate a glide vehicle before unpowered flight, HACM is intended to maintain hypersonic speeds throughout its cruise using a scramjet engine. This propulsion system allows the missile to take oxygen from the atmosphere, dedicating more internal volume to fuel and other components. The missile requires an initial propulsion stage to reach the necessary speed for the scramjet to operate effectively, a concept previously demonstrated by DARPA’s Hypersonic Air-breathing Weapon Concept (HAWC).
