China Launches Hypersonic Test Planes From Drones, Balloons

A video and pictures have emerged showing testing of Chinese high-flying and high-speed uncrewed air vehicles, including aerial releases from a TB-001 drone and a high-altitude balloon. The air vehicle designs are related to the MD-22, ostensibly a hypersonic testbed, which first broke cover two years ago.

The bulk of the new imagery comes from the video clip seen in the social media post below. Additional pictures have also appeared online. A machine translation of the audio accompanying the footage shows an apparent focus on the life and inspiration of Qian Xuesen, rather than the MD-series vehicles. Qian did pioneering aerospace work in the United States, including co-founding NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, before being caught up in the Red Scares of the 1950s. He was subsequently placed under partial house arrest before being deported to China, where he became instrumental in the country’s ballistic missile and space programs.

Still, the video does offer very interesting new looks and insights into the MD-22-related air vehicles. Examples are seen marked MD-19 and MD-21, as well as one where only “MD-2” is visible. The MD-19 sports the logos of the Institute of Mechanics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (IMCAS) and CAS itself on the rear left side of its central fuselage. The development team behind the MD-22 includes IMCAS, as well as the Guangdong Aerodynamic Research Academy (GARA).

In the video, the MD-19, MD-21, and “MD-2” all look to have the same general overall layout as the MD-22 with its wedge-shaped main fuselage, delta wings, and twin canted vertical tails. The MD-19 has retractable tricycle landing gear, a feature also depicted on the mockup of the MD-22 that first broke cover at the Zhuhai Airshow in 2022. The MD-22 design has been stated to be close to 35.5 feet (10.8 meters) long, had a wingspan of nearly 15 feet (4.5 meters), an empty weight of one ton, a maximum takeoff weight of four tons, a peak speed of Mach 7, and a maximum range of 4,970 miles (8,000 kilometers). The War Zone noted at the time that the range figure seemed, at best, highly aspirational and could reflect further iterations or evolutions of the design under development.

What kind of propulsion systems the MD-22 or any of these related vehicles use remains unclear. However, the new imagery further points to the core design being based around a single air-breathing main engine, possibly flanked by a pair of rocket motors. This, in turn, could indicate the use or planned use of advanced high-speed engines like dual-mode ramjets or scramjets, which do not work effectively at subsonic speeds. Platforms that use those engines therefore require some kind of initial boost, typically from one or more rocket motors. Aerodynamic fairings are seen in place at the rear of the MD-19 and “MD-2” vehicles in the newly emerged imagery, which could break away when the various engines/motors start.

The video and other images show the MD-19 being released from a TB-001 drone and then landing on a traditional runway. Whether this was a powered flight test or if the vehicle glided back down to Earth is unclear.

The MD-19 also looks to be between one-third and one-quarter of the length of the nearly 33-feet-long (10-meter-long) TB-001, or between roughly eight and 11 feet (2.5 and 3.35 meters). This is notably shorter than the MD-22.

Tengden’s TB-001 is a now well-established design, versions of which are in operational service with China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Though the TB-001 has been shown with various weapons and other stores loaded on pylons under its wings in the past, this appears to be the first time it has been seen launching another uncrewed platform of any kind in flight.

The newly emerged footage separately shows the “MD-2” vehicle, which also appears to be smaller than the MD-22, being loaded into a payload adapter, which is then carried aloft by a high-altitude balloon and released. It’s unclear if the vehicle’s subsequent flight was powered at any point and how or if it was recovered afterward. China actively uses high-altitude balloons for various research and development and test and evaluation activities, as well as intelligence-gathering purposes and other military purposes. This includes past hypersonic testing, as well as use as aerial launch platforms for drone swarms and other payloads with a clear eye to future operational capabilities as The War Zone has previously explored in depth.

There is the potential that the “MD-2” and MD-21, the latter of which is seen in the background at one point in the video, are one and the same, or at least examples of the same design. Given the known existence now of the MD-19, MD-21, and MD-22 vehicles, another possibility could be that the one released from the balloon was the MD-20.

Whether the various MD-series vehicles are all testbeds and/or test articles supporting the development of a single design or are differently scaled members of a family of designs, and whether there are any additional related types, are unknown. In April, a grainy image emerged showing a Chinese H-6 bomber variant carrying a still unidentified dark-colored aerospace vehicle, seen below, which may have been an MD-22 or a related design, under its fuselage. Versions of the H-6 are used operationally as launch platforms for the WZ-8 rocket-powered supersonic spy drone.

Past descriptions have presented the MD-22 as a platform intended to support the development of hypersonic technologies more broadly. The Chinese government has been investing heavily in hypersonic capabilities in general in recent years and continues to do so, and those developments certainly require an array of specialized test assets and associated infrastructure. Various testbeds, including Stratolaunch’s Talon-A, which is similar in some broad strokes to the MD types, but is larger and not air-breathing, are part of the U.S. military’s hypersonic development plans for the same reasons.

At the Zhuhai Airshow this year, the same GARA that worked on the MD-22 notably displayed a concept for an unpowered hypersonic boost-glide weapon called the GDF-600 designed to be loaded with various submunitions. Launching payloads of any kind from a platform traveling at hypersonic speed presents significant technological challenges because of the physical and thermal stresses involved, particularly during separation. The MD-series vehicles could be useful for proving out such a capability.

It remains unclear whether there are any plans to operationalize the MD-series vehicles directly, but it would not be hard to see potential interest in doing so. An MD-series platform used to demonstrate how a high-altitude hypersonic air vehicle could perform missions like kinetic strike or intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR), would be a clear stepping stone to an operational capability. Even smaller, shorter-range variations could be used in a similar role as the WZ-8 or even as missiles.

Combining rocket motors with a high-speed air-breathing main propulsion system would also offer a valuable self-contained solution that could allow for multiple launch options, as is seen in the newly emerged video. Being able to air-launch the vehicles could extend their reach and otherwise provide additional flexibility in a real-world context.

The U.S. Air Force had been working along broadly similar lines with its secretive Mayhem program, the future of which is now very murky, as you can read more about here.

From what we’ve seen now, China does appear to be very intent on turning the MD-22 into a reality.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com