The helicopter that you see today can travel a maximum of 150 miles an hour with today’s technology. With X2 technology, Sikorsky, a chopper manufacturing company, hopes to fly helicopters nearly twice the speed of today’s speed. That target is 290 miles an hour and that is nearly 40 miles faster than a helicopter has…

The Sikorsky X2 has just successfully finished its first 30 minute test flight on Wednesday which was scheduled to take place two years ago. The X2, which is designed to cruise at 250kts, now enters a four-phase series of flight tests. The flight tests will support a decision expected in 2010 on whether to launch…

For several years, Sikorsky has been working on what it calls X2 technology, a suite of systems that it says could let a helicopter “cruise comfortably” at 250 knots. That would be a far zippier pace than most current rotary wing aircraft can handle. The UH-60L variant of Sikorsky’s Blackhawk, for instance, can fly at…