The US Navy and Army held three tests on hypersonic weapon component prototypes on Wednesday that will inform the development of new weapons, the Pentagon said on Thursday.

The Sandia National Laboratory ran the tests from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia which should “inform the development of the Navy’s Conventional Prompt Strike and the Army’s Long Range Hypersonic Weapon offensive hypersonic strike capability”.

The Pentagon said the test comprised of three precision sounding rocket launches containing hypersonic experiments and “demonstrated advanced hypersonic technologies, capabilities, and prototype systems in a realistic operating environment”.