The second test flight of Lockheed Martin Corp.’s hypersonic missile prototype was marred by the weapon’s failure to transmit in-flight performance data, two people familiar with the results have said, in a setback for U.S. efforts to catch up with China and Russia in a key weapons capability.
The transmission failure and loss of data in the March 13 exercise wasn’t reported in a statement issued by the U.S. Air Force on March 24, which said the test "met several of the objectives and team engineers and testers are collecting data for further analysis.”
After being released from a B-52H bomber off the southern coast of California, the warhead successfully separated from its rocket booster and proceeded into flight. After that, however, the data link transmitting in-flight performance information failed, said the people, who asked not to be identified discussing non-public information.