Flight times from London to Sydney could be cut to just four hours by the 2030s with the advent of hypersonic engines.

Graham Turnock, the head of the UK Space Agency, said work carried out by Reaction Engines on the pioneering Synergetic Air-Breathing Rocket Engine (Sabre) engine would drastically reduce flight times.

Traveling from London to New York using the system could one day take as little as one hour.

Mr Turnock said: “When we have brought the Sabre rocket engine to fruition, that may enable us to get to Australia in perhaps as little as four hours.”

Aircraft fitted with hypersonic technology would be able to travel at twice the speed of Concorde – the equivalent of five times the speed of sound.

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