‘Most advanced re-entry spacecraft’
Michael Martin/Released
In 1999, NASA chose Boeing to design a re -purpose orbital test vehicle, which was for closely monitoring and repairing satellites.
Over the next four years, the X-37 received several designs repetitions to achieve more aerial design than the Space Shuttle Orbiter. It was initially intended to launch a space shuttle with cargo bay. But in 2003 all seven astronauts were killed on the board after the space shuttle Colombia crashed, designed to launch it with a separate rocket, making it small and more autonomous.
The cost of the project is approximately $ 192 million, and Boeing was given a contract of $ 301 million through a joint research effort led by the Space Launch Initiative, NASA and the Department of Defense in 2002. The X-37 project was transferred to the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency in 2004 and classified due to its military applications.
In 2006, the Air Force announced the development of its own version of the space aircraft, known as the X-37B, designed to operate with a orbital speed of about 17,500 mph for 270 days. Was gone
No thought -testing vehicle was about 30 feet long and had a feather of about 15 feet. Its maximum takeoff weighs 11,000 pounds, and it can accommodate a payload of up to 500 pounds.
The X-37B program “Most Advanced Re-Entry Spacecraft” was dubbed, which will focus on “risk reduction, experimentation and operating concept development for re-purpose space vehicle technologies in support of prolonged developmental space objectives, “The then Air Force Secretary Michael Vine said in 2006.
Scrutinize
Senior Airman Timothy Kirchner
The X-37B was assigned with several orbital missions, which from the terms of the space to release a small satellite with their own experimental payloads under the terms of the space.
The first X-37B vehicle was launched in class in April 2010 from Cape Canverals. The test vehicle spent 225 days in space and returned after conducting several orbit changes in December 2010, although the data collected during its first mission was classified.
In 2020, the sixth mission of the X-37B included the first time involving a small service module in space. FalconSat -8 was a small satellite developed by the US Air Force Academy with five experimental payloads. After a record of 908 days in space, X-37B completed its mission and landed at the Kennedy Space Center in November 2022.
Because many X-37B programs are classified, privacy speculated about the purpose of its mission set, some estimates that space aircraft may be a weapon platform or used for intelligence, monitoring and reconnaissance from space May go.
Launched from a spacex rocket
US Air Force Courtesy Photo
The X-37b began in December 2023 on its seventh and current mission, launched from Falcon Heavy Rocket, which was built and launched by SpaceX of Elon Musk.
Falcon Heavy is capable of launching more than 22,000 feet of payload from the Earth, so the X -37B was more launched than any other spaceplane and flew into a highly egg -class orbit.
According to the space force, the purpose of its seventh mission was to experiment with “Future Space Domain Awareness Technologies” and analyze radiation effects on plant seeds during the spaceflight.
Another major objective of the current mission of the X-37B is to refine and execute a novel exercise called aerobreaking, which is to transfer the Earth’s atmosphere to a minimum orbit and to safely dispose of service module components using minimal fuel using minimal fuel Is. Changing orbit is an important ability, which should be used to upgrade American satellites or disable its opponents.
US ‘X -37B vs. Shenelong of China
Senior Airman Timothy Kirchner
The X-37B is known for the conduct of testing and scientific experiments in space, but the details about its military applications are highly classified.
The operation of space-based technology for decades, including the X-37B, has an edge on the new frontier of Orbital Warfare. China follows its own spacecraft closely following the US, known as Shenalong, named after a dragon Lord in Chinese mythology.
Like the X -37B, much about the aircraft is still immersed in mystery. Shanelong was first declared in 2007, but China has publicly revealed some details about the top-tipped space aircraft program. There are no known images of Shanelong, and among some capabilities that are known about unmanned vehicles, it is that it can deploy through a rocket, can quickly maneuver in space, and the payload Can deploy into space, much like X -37B.
During his first orbital flight in September 2020, Shanelong stayed in space for two days to leave an object in class before returning to Earth.
Its second launch in August 2022 was long to work in class for nine months. The Chinese Spaceplane was allegedly practicing to deploy exercises and recover a subcatelite, operating a subcatelite, requiring similar techniques to catch an enemy satellite.
In December 2023, the third mission of Shanelong, which began exactly seven months after the second, was allegedly a similar purpose, which issues an object from cargo hold to test proximity to the proximity. It returned to China last September and completed its mission after nine months in space.