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China’s rail gun sends smart bomb into stratosphere at hypersonic speed, then something goes wrong
- Winged projectile achieves Mach 5, reaching altitude of 15km in test but was sent off course by rotation speeds, investigation shows
- Lu Junyong and his team identified the cause of the problem with the help of artificial intelligence and propose solutions in peer-reviewed paper
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Stephen Chenin Beijing
The Chinese navy has tested an electromagnetic rail gun, firing a smart bomb 15km (9 miles) high into the stratosphere at a speed exceeding Mach 5, according to scientists involved in the project.
This is the maximum flying altitude of an American B-2 stealth bomber, where the atmospheric pressure is only about one-tenth of that at sea level. With a pair of gliding wings, the precision-guided projectile descended along a relatively gentle curve and hit the ground after about three minutes in flight.
But the test was later declared unsuccessful.
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“The projectile did not follow the expected trajectory and the maximum range and altitude did not meet the design values,” said the Naval Engineering University team led by Lu Junyong in a peer-reviewed paper published by the academic journal Transactions of China Electrotechnical Society.
After scrutinising data transmitted back to the ground by the smart bomb, Lu’s team discovered that the projectile was rotating too fast during its ascent, resulting in an undesired tilt.
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With the help of artificial intelligence technology, Lu and his colleagues were able to identify the cause of the failure and find solutions to overcome this technical hurdle impeding the practical application of rail guns.
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