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(NASA Photo)

    WASHINGTON, March 27 (Xinhuanet) -- The US space agency NASA successfully tested on Saturday an experimental X-43A plane which briefly flew at seven times the speed of sound.

    The unpiloted vehicle was dropped from a B-52 aircraft and thenboosted to nearly 100,000 feet (30,000 meters) by rocket. After anapproximate 10 second test firing of the engine, the X-43A glided through the atmosphere for several minutes before splashing into the Pacific Ocean.

    The X-43A was expected to fly briefly under its own power at approximately 5,000 miles per hour, NASA said earlier. 

  This was the first time a non-rocket, air-breathing scramjet engine has powered a vehicle in flight at hypersonic speeds. In a scramjet (supersonic-combustion ramjet), the flow of air through the engine remains supersonic for optimum engine efficiency and vehicle speed.

    NASA researchers believed that scramjet technologies may someday offer more airplane-like operations and other benefits compared to traditional rocket systems.

    NASA conducted the first X-43A test in June, 2001. But the flight ended in failure when a modified Pegasus rocket used to accelerate the plane veered off course and had to be destroyed. Enditem