India Moves Closer to Domestic Hypersonic Missile Development

The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) has successfully conducted a long-duration ground test of a full-scale, actively cooled scramjet engine. 

 

The test was carried out on January 9, 2026, at the Scramjet Connect Pipe Test (SCPT) facility of the Defence Research & Development Laboratory (DRDL) in Hyderabad.

The engine ran for over 12 minutes, marking a major milestone in India’s Hypersonic Cruise Missile programme. This follows a successful sub-scale test conducted in April 2025.

Designed and developed by DRDL with support from Indian industry partners, the scramjet combustor and the SCPT facility have both been validated through this test. 

 

The scramjet engine uses supersonic combustion to enable sustained flight at speeds exceeding Mach 5 (over 6,100 km/h).