HERMEUS and AWS enroute to Revolutionize Air Travel

Hypersonic travel refers to the ability to travel at extremely high speeds. It involves the use of advanced aerospace technology, such as supersonic combustion engines, or other propulsion systems, to achieve such velocities. Compared to traditional aviation methods, hypersonic travel holds the potential to drastically reduce travel times for long-distance journeys, enabling people and goods to reach their destinations in a fraction of the time. This technology could revolutionize air transportation, opening up new possibilities for global connectivity and economic growth.

During the 2023 AWS Summit, Washington DC, Nandu Shah, VP of Information at Hermeus Corporation, an Atlanta, Georgia-based American startup company, currently dedicated to advancing commercial hypersonic aircraft sat down with Clint Crosier, Director, Aerospace and Satellite, AWS, and shared valuable insights regarding the hypersonic aircraft they are developing in collaboration with AWS. Their groundbreaking efforts aim to create hypersonic aircraft capable of completing long-distance journeys in an astonishingly rapid manner, delivering an experience that is nothing short of extraordinary.

According to Nandu Shah, VP of Information, Hermeus “Hermeus mission is to radically accelerate air travel hypersonic flight. We are working with our partners to develop a series of aircraft to derisk the technology on the way to commercial hypersonic flight. Right now, we're working on our flight test vehicle quarterhorse, which we are working on ground testing and flying later this year, early next year”

Hermeus is making the aircraft at their factory in Atlanta and has a series of tests planned to ground test, high-speed takeoff, and landing. Currently, they have three vehicles. Quarterhorse, Darkhorse and Halcyon. Both quarterhorse and darkhorse are remotely piloted. At the moment, they are focused primarily on quarterhorse and the initial rounds of testing. They are also beginning work on Darkhorse which is designed for the government and that’s where the bigger market opportunity is according to Hermeus.

Source: www.hermeus.com

Quarterhorse is a remotely piloted high-speed aircraft that excels in sprinting short distances. Its purpose is to validate hermeus chimera engine in-flight and aims to touch Mach 4+ speeds.

Darkhorse is a hypersonic UAS (uncrewed aerial system)multi-mission capable aircraft for defense and intelligence customers.

Halcyon is a hypersonic commercial 20-passenger aircraft that can travel over 125 trans-oceanic routes.

Hermeusis actively integrates existing technologies to bring its hypersonic aircraft to life. Their primary focus lies in addressing the significant challenges surrounding engineering and cost reduction.

For the past couple of years, Hermeus has forged a collaborative partnership with AWS, utilizing a range of AWS Cloud services. By leveraging the elasticity and on-demand infrastructure offered by AWS Cloud, Hermeus has been able to achieve significant cost reductions. The ability to expand and contract cloud resources based on demand makes it an ideal solution for Hermeus, enabling them to optimize their operations efficiently and effectively. This collaboration with AWS has played a crucial role in supporting Hermeus development of advanced hypersonic aircraft.

Security is a vital aspect for Hermeus, and they have prioritized it by leveraging AWS GovCloud. By utilizing AWS GovCloud, Hermeus ensures compliance with the stringent requirements set by various departments for their programs. With its certifications and standardization, AWS GovCloud provides a secure environment that aligns with the specific needs of Hermeus. This allows Hermeus to maintain the highest levels of security and regulatory compliance while continuing to advance its hypersonic aircraft development initiatives.

Hermeus recognizes the importance of having advanced cloud capabilities in remote and disconnected environments. To address this, they have adopted AWS Snowball, a ruggedized solution provided by AWS. By leveraging AWS Snowball for storage and computing, Hermeus is able to meet their requirements for edge devices and ensure seamless operations in challenging environments.

Hermeus utilizes AWS Snowball for three key purposes. Firstly, they employ it for collecting test data, enabling efficient data gathering even in remote locations. Secondly, Hermeus utilizes Snowball to host local software repositories. Lastly, they leverage Snowball for software-based automation. The use of AWS Snowball by Hermeus exemplifies their commitment to leveraging innovative technologies to overcome challenges and enable advanced cloud capabilities in diverse operational scenarios.

Talking about using high-performance computing and What is about the compute that really allows Hermeus to accelerate work, Nandu Shah said “For high-performance computing, we use AWS parallel cluster which allows us to run across 1000s of nodes, 1000s of CPUs at a time and its elastic. We do all of our heavy modeling and simulation workloads on that infrastructure. We use those modeling and simulation capabilities to iterate over the design until we had something we're confident enough that we wanted to build and actually test in the real world”

While hypersonic aircraft present exciting opportunities, their development and deployment come with challenges including thermal management, structural integrity, safety considerations, and high cost. However, it will be interesting to see how hermeus overcomes these challenges and brings hypersonic aircraft into practical use.