American media reports the aircraft dubbed Falcon Hypersonic Technology Vehicle 2 will be launched into the Earth's atmosphere aboard an eight-story Minotaur IV rocket, made by Orbital Sciences Corp.
The arrowhead-shaped plane could reach a blistering speed of almost 21000 km/hr while withstanding temperatures of almost 2000 degrees, hotter than the melting point of steel.
After the launch, the Falcon will dislodge from the rocket, speed back towards earth, level out and glide above the Pacific at 20 times the speed of sound.
It is then expected to crash and sink near Kwajalein Atoll, about 6400 kilometres from Vandenberg, about 30 minutes after the launch.
At its top speed it could travel the 17,000 kilometres between London and Sydney in about 49 minutes.
Funded by US Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, the Falcon is an reportedly an experiment to test a new technology that would provide the Pentagon a vehicle capable of delivering a “prompt global strike” anywhere in the world in less than an hour.
It will be the second flight of the Falcon. The first flight, which took place in April last year, ended prematurely after only nine minutes.
In June, the US Air Force had to prematurely end a test flight of its experimental X-51 WaveRider plane when a lapse in airflow to the jet engine caused a shutdown.