Tomasz NOGA, Michał PAKOSZ, Piotr UMIŃSKI, Krzysztof MATYSEK

DOI Number: N/A

Conference number: HiSST-2025-262

One of the key challenges associated with high-speed vehicle science and technology is availability, cost and performance of test vehicles. Especially in Europe, the number of demonstrated, ready-to-fly vehicles is very limited, hindering the European high-speed science and technology. This paper presents a new, flight-proven suborbital launch system that can provide Europe independent and sovereign access to low Hypersonic speeds and discusses its applicability to various types of hypersonic research. The ILR-33 AMBER 2K launch vehicle is a Polish suborbital rocket developed in-house along with its ground segment in Łukasiewicz Research Network – Institute of Aviation, Poland. The launch system
has been flight-proven 5 times, with recent flight from Andøya Sub-orbital constituting a significant milestone by achieving the edge of space. Now, the launch system is ready to serve various end-users, including high-speed science and technology. Equipped with additional boosters, the rocket can provide short reentry Mach 6 in a high-altitude flight or prolonged periods well over Mach 5 when optimized for such flight. While achievable Mach numbers and payload masses are limited, this solution can offer short time-to-flight and a low unit cost of a rocket enabling numerous flight tests during a single campaign. System elements, such as the rocket’s hybrid motor or multi-purpose launcher are ready to
become elements of new, larger hypersonic vehicles. Due to the nature of hypersonic missions, flight over international waters are preferred in an European context, and AMBER is known to test ranges with such access. The paper discusses requirements of various high-speed science and technology missions and discusses AMBER systems applicability and readiness to perform such missions. Several mission concepts are shown. The AMBER launch system shows promise to serve as a sovereign provider of low hypersonic speeds for European high-speed science and technology missions. It is envisaged that the system can serve as a low-cost, first flight test for newly developed technologies before their used in less frequent missions in a more demanding environment.

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In Categories: 1.Events, 1.HiSST 2025, High-Speed Missions and Vehicles
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