Bohemia firm to spend $2 million on development of hypersonic aircraft engines, creating 15 jobs

A larg e defense contractor plans to make $2 million in improvements to its Bohemia facility where  hypersonic aircraft engines are being developed.

The investment by GE Aerospace will allow its Innoveering subsidiary at 61 Keyland Ct. to add at least 15 jobs to the workforce of more than 60 people, officials told Newsday.

The company employed 29 people in 2019.

GE Aerospace, which is based outside Cincinnati, purchased Innoveering in 2022 for an undisclosed amount.

The $2 million investment follows a $2 million investment made last year, officials said.

“Every dollar strengthens our foundation for developing the breakthroughs in hypersonic propulsion that will define the next era in the future of flight,” said Dean Modroukas, the Bohemia site’s top executive.

GE Aerospace’s Innoveering division is among the 400-plus aerospace and defense contractors on Long Island and in Brooklyn and Queens. Together, the companies employ 25,000 people and generate more than $10 billion in economic activity per year, according to the Uniondale-based trade group Aerospace & Defense Diversification Alliance in Peacetime Transition.

Innoveering is developing a dual-mode ramjet engine that can be used to power hypersonic aircraft. Such aircraft can fly at more than five times the speed of sound, or Mach 5, Newsday has previously reported.

The ramjet engine has no moving parts. It directs air flowing at a high speed into an inlet and ignites it with small amounts of fuel.

A dual-mode engine can change its geometry to operate as a scramjet. Unlike a ramjet, whose engine slows the internal airflow to subsonic speeds, a scramjet allows a supersonic airflow through its engine. Scramjets can reach supersonic speeds, exceeding Mach 5, Newsday has reported.

The United States, Russia and China have been competing to be the first to develop aircraft, missiles and artillery shells that travel at hypersonic speeds. In 2018, Boeing unveiled a concept for a commercial airliner with a dual-mode ramjet.

Company spokesman Todd E. Alhart told Newsday the Innoveering expansion hasn’t received assistance from state and local economic development agencies.

He also said the local project is part of a $1 billion investment that GE Aerospace is making in its U.S. factories and suppliers.

Besides the Innoveering site, GE Aerospace has a factory in Bohemia that makes power conversion and electronic systems for miliary and commercial aircraft.

“The investments we announced for Bohemia are entirely for the Innoveering site, the spokesman said on Tuesday.