VANDENBERG AIR FORCE BASE, Calif., April 28 (UPI) -- The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency said it lost the signal from its Falcon Hypersonic Technology Vehicle-2 following a successful launch.
Space technology company Orbital Sciences Corp. hailed the successful launch of its Minotaur IV rocket that carried DARPA's Hypersonic Technology Vehicle-2, a space glider, into space.
Orbital Sciences launched the Minotaur from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., last week. The company said the rocket flew a suborbital trajectory and delivered the HTV-2 glide vehicle to the desired separation conditions.
DARPA described the HTV-2 program as a glide vehicle meant to test unmanned flight at speeds of up to Mach 20, about 15,200 miles an hour.
Aviation Week reported that the vehicle was meant to serve as an ultra-high speed, high-atmosphere global strike weapon. The report said the first mission was meant to collect aerodynamic data with a 2011 test set to test speeds of up to Mach 25.
DARPA announced that it lost the signal from the HTV-2 about 9 minutes into the mission.
"An engineering team is reviewing available data to understand this event," the defense agency said.
