Scramjet Milestones (Part 2) On July 29, 2002 the University of Queensland launched a scramjet in a Terrier Orion Mk70 rocket about 370 km into the sky.  Upon plummeting back to earth, the scramjet fired for a few seconds before impact.                       http://www.mech.uq.edu.au/hyper/hyshot/HyShot_photos.html On March 27, 2004 NASA's 12ft X-43 plane became the first to successfully incorporate a scramjet engine and fly under it's power for 10 seconds.  This made it the worlds fastest air-breathing (i.e. not rocket propelled) aircraft at Mach 6.8316.  On November 16, 2004 the X-43 plane flew for the 3rd time, this time reaching a speed of Mach  9.8.                           http://www.dfrc.nasa.gov/Gallery/Photo/X-43A/index.html