US Air Force fires hypersonic ARRW in first test since March failure

The Air Force on August 19 conducted its latest test of a prototype hypersonic AGM-183A Air-launched Rapid Response Weapon, collecting data it hopes will help it develop future weapons that can travel at greater than Mach 5.

The Air Force said in a statement that a B-52H Stratofortress released a full operational prototype ARRW, known as an all-up round, off the coast of Southern California. ARRW is made by Lockheed Martin, Defense News reports.

This ARRW test marked the first since a failed test of another operational prototype in March. After an announcement about that test was silent on whether it had achieved its objectives, Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall soon afterwards told Congress it was “not a success.” Kendall also told lawmakers the service was more committed to the HACM than ARRW, and that the ARRW’s future is in doubt, with a decision on whether to continue with the program likely to come as part of the fiscal 2025 budget process.

Hypersonic weapons travel at speeds greater than Mach 5, or more than 3,836 miles per hour, and are highly manoeuvrable, which makes them difficult to track and shoot down. Lawmakers have expressed concern that the U.S. military has not done enough to develop and field hypersonic weapons, and that the nation may be falling behind Chinese and Russian hypersonic capabilities.

The service said it would not discuss specific objectives of the August 19 test, and did not say whether it considered the test a success. But the Air Force said it “gained valuable new insights into the capabilities” of ARRW, and that the data would help it advance programs such as ARRW and the service’s other major hypersonic weapon program, the Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile.

The Air Force said the test focused on ARRW’s end-to-end performance, and that it also validated and improved the service’s test and evaluation capabilities to continue to develop advanced hypersonic systems.

In another March hearing, Air Force acquisition chief Andrew Hunter said the Air Force was still planning to conduct the last two ARRW all-up round test flights to collect data for future hypersonic programs.