It has 25 times the speed of sound

The Skylon helicopter, developed by the UK space company Reaction Engines, can fly anywhere on Earth within 4 hours.

Thanks to the plane's SABER engine, you can fly to the other side of the globe at lunch and return home before dinner. SABER has two operating modes. The first is the air-breathing mode, which draws oxygen from the atmosphere, and burns with liquid hydrogen in the combustion chamber to send the aircraft out of the Earth's atmosphere. Once out of the atmosphere, the engine will switch to conventional rocket mode, with liquid oxygen fuel, according to Science ealert.

Illustrations of super-planes speed 25 times the speed of sound. Photo: Reaction Engines.

According to the developers, in theory, the aircraft with this engine could reach speeds of up to five times the speed of sound after it comes from the runway and remains in the Earth's atmosphere. After switching to missile mode, it will reach 25 times the speed of sound.

In addition, one of the major innovations of the new engine system is cooling. Its heat exchanger is 100 times lighter than current technologies, which can lower the hot air temperatures from over 1,000 degrees Celsius to -150 degrees Celsius in less than 1% seconds.

The project has taken a big step this week, when Reaction announced its partnership with BAE Systems , a major defense and aerospace company, and a significant financial investment from the British government. This partnership will enable Reaction to develop a new SABRE engine class by 2020 and test flights five years later.

"Today's announcement is an important milestone in the transformation of Reaction Engines, focusing on research and testing of feasible technologies for SABER to develop and test the world's first complete SABER engine. " said Mark Thomas, Managing Director of Reaction Engines.