Locals in southwestern France and northern Spain spotted strange footprints on Monday
Paris confirmed they had successfully completed their first flight test hypersonic glider after various sightings of tangled trails in the skies over the Spanish and French Pyrenees.
Hypersonic gliders use a boost-plan launch system. First, the missile launches the weapon into space before the payload glides back into the atmosphere towards its target at hypersonic speed.
“These hypersonic gliders are able to overcome the most sophisticated air defense systems: these are missiles that can achieve unprecedented speeds of 6,000 to 7,000 kilometers per hour,” Florence Parly, the former French defense minister, recently said.
“In other words , they can cover the distance between Dunkirk and Nice in 12 minutes,” she added.
The non-ballistic nature of their re-entry trajectory makes their trajectory unpredictable and therefore difficult to shoot down by enemy fire.
>How a hypersonic missile works
Meteo Pyrenees, a local weather forecaster, was one of the first to post a photo of curious trails in the sky that resemble cobwebs over the Caso airbase and are “visible from most of the region.”
On Monday, numerous witnesses from southwestern France and northern Spain reported seeing a very fast aircraft hovering at high altitude and speed, leaving a distinct white trail behind it.
Residents near Biscarrosse in western France were among the first to witness the flight shortly after 10 p.m. local time. Viewers then shared photos in Bordeaux, Toulouse and even neighboring Spain.
French Directorate General of Armaments (DGA), its procurement and technology agency, later confirmed that it had carried out the first test firings. sounding rocket with a demonstrator of the V-MAX hypersonic glider.
It turns out that the glider is a demonstrator of the Véhicule Manoeuvrant Expérimental program, which has been run by the aerospace company ArianeGroup since 2019.
On Tuesday, the DGA said in a statement: “Featuring a host of onboard technology innovations, these flight tests have been an unprecedented technical challenge that prepares the future of our national hypervelocity roadmap. France is one of the few countries in the world with reliable expertise in this area.”
“Bravo to all our teams who worked on this flight and are committed to this program every day,” the message says.
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Two years ago, the French Ministry of Defense announced that the V-MAX demonstrator would be completed. first flight “in the coming months”, but nothing happened.
Then, at a hearing last month ahead of the upcoming French military planning law for 2024-2030, Charles-Henri du Ches, ArianeGroup's military adviser , said the demonstrator would fly “very soon.”
“So we're just in time,” Mr. du Ches said, adding that this initial demonstrator would lead to a second, more advanced craft called the V- MAX 2 “which could take off in 2024 or 2025.”
Experts have already warned on social media that a test launch is just around the corner, after noticing that France had set up a restricted maritime zone between 26 to 30 June, covering 2,000 kilometers. (about 1080 nautical miles) west of the DGA missile range at Biscarosse, into the Bay of Biscay and the Celtic Sea. Zones are restricted at this time due to “missile operations”.
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