Northrop Grumman Corporation successfully completed two test flights of its Advanced Hypersonic Technology Inertial Measurement Unit at hypersonic speed, leveraging Stratolaunch’s reusable hypersonic airplane, Talon-A. These advanced flight tests move engineers one step closer to precisely navigating hypersonic vehicles in GPS-denied environments, further protecting the trajectory of the hypersonic vehicle from adversary threats.

Survivability of the navigation unit, also known as a hemispherical resonator gyroscope, is a major accomplishment due to the harsh environment hypersonic speed presents and the intense forces experienced as the technology operates within Earth’s atmospheric boundary. This technology collected hours of critical ground and flight data, pivotal for future development.