X-37B returns successfully to Earth after 908 days in orbit
One of the two X-37B reusable mini-shuttles that Boeing built for the military successfully returned to Earth early this morning after completing 908 days in orbit, a new longevity record.
This was the sixth mission of the crewless reusable plane, built by Boeing and jointly operated by the U.S. Space Force and the Air Force Rapid Capabilities Office. Known as Orbital Test Vehicle 6, it launched to orbit May 17, 2020, on a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket.
On this mission the X-37B carried several U.S. military and NASA science experiments, including a Naval Research Laboratory project to capture sunlight and convert it into direct current electrical energy, and the U.S. Air Force Academy’s FalconSat-8, which remains in orbit.
It appears, based on the amount of information released after landing, that the Space Force is making more of what it does and will do on this and future X-37B flights more public.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
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One of the two X-37B reusable mini-shuttles that Boeing built for the military successfully returned to Earth early this morning after completing 908 days in orbit, a new longevity record.
This was the sixth mission of the crewless reusable plane, built by Boeing and jointly operated by the U.S. Space Force and the Air Force Rapid Capabilities Office. Known as Orbital Test Vehicle 6, it launched to orbit May 17, 2020, on a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket.
On this mission the X-37B carried several U.S. military and NASA science experiments, including a Naval Research Laboratory project to capture sunlight and convert it into direct current electrical energy, and the U.S. Air Force Academy’s FalconSat-8, which remains in orbit.
It appears, based on the amount of information released after landing, that the Space Force is making more of what it does and will do on this and future X-37B flights more public.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation:
5. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
That‘s a very nice spaceplane. Too bad there‘s no pilot! I guess the Air Force of the future won‘t need any flying officers, just button-pushers & lever-pullers.
I would like to see a Buran style Shuttle 2
https://www.reddit.com/r/KerbalSpaceProgram/comments/gyepg3/the_new_and_improved_jsc_space_shuttle_ii/
My thoughts:
https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/us-space-shuttle-projects.1928/page-13#post-562354
Jeff, I don’t think we need a return to the Shuttle design with the external tanks and side boosters. The vertically landing Starship is the ideal design for interplanetary use as there are no runways elsewhere. Extending that design to landing here on Earth keeps a certain consistency and simplicity in the total vehicle design.
The shuttle shape is a wonderful design for small craft like this.
Being smaller and lighter it slows down much easier and faster coming back into the atmosphere.
David, remote is great and needed but it’s almost as if everyone ignores what a major power could do to jam all comms, even light spectrum. I’m sure the military plans for this but history isn’t on the side of them being foolproof. I bet self auto piloting AI is an answer they are using for some platforms but that brings in another set of problems. Just hope we aren’t fighting anyone greater than Iran or similar.
There are many different kinds of Shuttlecraft