Pentagon developing supersonic shape-shifting assassin (PopSci.com)

[eppur_se_muova]

The Supersonic Shape-Shifting Bomber
With a shift of its wing, the Pentagon’s next attack drone goes from long-range endurance flyer to Mach-speed assassin

By Noah Shachtman | July 2006

For years, the U.S. military has wanted a plane that could loiter just outside enemy territory for more than a dozen hours and, on command, hurtle toward a target faster than the speed of sound. And then level it. But aircraft that excel at subsonic flight are inefficient at Mach speeds, and vice versa. The answer is Switchblade, an unmanned, shape-changing plane concept under development by Northrop Grumman.

When completed (target date: 2020), it will cruise with its 200-foot-long wing perpendicular to its engines like a normal airplane. But just before the craft breaks the sound barrier, its single wing will swivel around 60 degrees (hence the name) so that one end points forward and the other back. This oblique configuration redistributes the shock waves that pile up in front of a plane at Mach speeds and cause drag. When the Switchblade returns to subsonic speeds, the wing will rotate back to perpendicular.

Smart plan. Now for the hard part: designing the thing. Darpa, the Pentagon’s way-out research arm, has coughed up $10.3 million to Northrop Grumman to produce a detailed blueprint by November 2007. A flying test vehicle is due about four years later. The initial concept calls for a single wing with engines situated in a pod underneath, along with munitions and surveillance equipment. This setup will enable the wing to pivot while the engines remain pointed in the direction the craft is traveling.
***
If all goes well, Darpa says, a 40-foot-wingspan demonstration model could be ready by 2010, and a full-size Switchblade should be all set for a brawl by 2020.


***
more: http://www.popsci.com/popsci/aviationspace/0f2505a52aceb010vgnvcm1000004eecbccdrcrd.html

Oh, goody! Another high-tech toy to blow the living hell out of targets we can't see clearly enough to identify correctly. Doesn't that headline just scream "good news!" ?

[whistle]

1. Great idea, shall we allow congress to gut the entire education

...department budget so that we can have this weapon in our arsenal? Christ, we can already destroy entire countries with the weapon systems we have now!

[DavidDvorkin]

2. Imagine Great Britain in 1906

Planning a new warship that would come into duty in 1920 and would cement Britain's control of the world's oceans. In retrospect, we can see the flaw in that scenario.