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Space United States The Military

SpaceX Will Help US Space Force Launch Its Secretive X-37B Space Plane (nbcnews.com) 36

Posted by EditorDavid from the domain-awareness-technologies dept.
"The United States military is preparing to launch its secretive X-37B space plane on a seventh mission in orbit," reports NBC News.

Shaped like a small space shuttle, "It's an itty-bitty spaceplane, not quite 30 feet long and under 10 feet tall," writes the Washington Post, "with a pair of stubby wings and a rounded, bulldog-like nose." Space.com says the launch window for the uncrewed vehicle opens Monday at 8:14 p.m. EST.

From NBC News: For the first time, the X-37B will ride into orbit atop a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket. Since its debut more than a decade ago, the X-37B has been a source of intrigue within the space community, mostly owing to the mysterious nature of its activities in low Earth orbit. Despite not knowing its true purpose or location, skywatchers have occasionally spotted and photographed the space plane in the night sky using telescopes... The military is tight-lipped about such operations, but the Space Force said the X-37B missions "are key to ensuring safe and responsible operations in space for all users of the space domain..."
The "U.S. Space Force says that launching on SpaceX's Falcon Heavy rocket will allow testing "in new orbital regimes, experimenting with space domain awareness technologies and investigating the radiation effects to NASA materials."

The Washington Post notes that "The reference about 'space domain awareness' could mean that it will be keeping an eye on other satellites, potentially watching for threats": At least one part of the mission is known. The vehicle will "expose plant seeds to the harsh radiation environment of long-duration spaceflight" in an experiment for NASA. In the past, the Pentagon has also used the X-37B to test some of its cutting edge technologies, including a small solar panel designed to transform solar energy into microwaves, a technology that one day could allow energy harnessed in space to be beamed back to Earth...

If Sunday's X-37B mission is like previous ones, the spaceplane could be in space for a while. Its first flight, which launched in 2010, lasted 224 days.
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SpaceX Will Help US Space Force Launch Its Secretive X-37B Space Plane More

SpaceX Will Help US Space Force Launch Its Secretive X-37B Space Plane

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  • Space Lasers Incoming (Score:3)

    by zenlessyank ( 748553 ) on Sunday December 10, 2023 @02:52PM (#64071065)

    "a technology that one day could allow energy harnessed in space to be beamed back to Earth..."

    I like how they word that. Surface dwellers beware.

    • Yes. The political problems from beamed power may turn out to be as difficult as the technical ones.

  • At least one part of the mission is known. The vehicle will "expose plant seeds to the harsh radiation environment of long-duration spaceflight" in an experiment for NASA

    Really, that's all they could find ? As there were not 100s of such experiment in the ISS with real "long-duration" ?

    • Either it's absolutely made up, or it's something deeply nefarious. Dropping seeds of invasive genetically modified species of plants over remote enemy territory sounds like something the spooks would do.

      Imagine dropping corn seeds engineered to grow a toxic variety across enemy farms. Years of slashing and burning would be needed to guarantee none remains.

  • > Launch Complex-39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center

    This one isn't Vandenberg so probably not a polar orbit so probably not a Black Knight rendezvous as suspected of a previous flight.

    Classification of science is just dumb.

  • I hope its been added to the contract that (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Growlley ( 6732614 ) on Sunday December 10, 2023 @04:39PM (#64071281)
    the tax payer gets refunded for both the flight and cargo if it undergoes an unscheduled dissasmembly.
    • Falcon 9 and Heavy have a damn near perfect track record over the last few years. 100 launches of falcon this year alone. All of them go perfectly. The only time recently there is a mishap is sometimes returning to booster back to earth and even that is extremely rare these days and a failing booster return doesn't jeopardize the mission. It just makes future missions cost more cause now they gotta rebuilt the lost booster instead of being able to reuse it. I'd trust falcon to take up any payload more than

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by crow ( 16139 )

      The National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) was in charge of launching spy satellites, and at one point would always budget for two in case one blew up. They were super expensive, and many didn't need the backup funding. Everything was classified, so the agency just kept the extra money and eventually got found out when they built a new expensive headquarters building without asking for funding.

  • They have the insigna and they have the remote-controlled space plane.

    Someone has done a lot of shopping at the latest Star Trek convention with all those taxpayers' billions...

  • "SpaceX Will Help US Space Force Launch" (Score:5, Informative)

    by greytree ( 7124971 ) on Sunday December 10, 2023 @05:07PM (#64071335)
    "Help launch" ?

    Try "launch".

    • I dunno, does the X37B have its own insertion engine/tanks? IE: Does it replace the SpaceX second stage? If SpaceX is just the suborbital first stage, then "help launch" seems fine.

      • "does the X37B have its own insertion engine/tanks?"

        The peroxide is for maneuvering/rentry.

        "About 2.5 minutes into the flight, the Falcon 9's two stages separated. While the second stage continued hauling the X-37B to orbit, [...]

        Spacex *launches* it.

        https://www.space.com/38067-spacex-launches-x-37b-space-plane.html

  • Plant seeds? PLANT SEEDS?

    You mean like the original plant seed experiments on the Space Shuttle in the 1980's? You mean like the plant seed experiments we constantly hear about going on on the ISS? WTF does a military shuttle need to do plant seed experiments for? Haven't we done them all yet?

    Someone with a relevant degree please explain to me why plant seed experiments would be important to the US military?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )

      The "U.S. Space Force says that launching on SpaceX's Falcon Heavy rocket will allow testing "in new orbital regimes, experimenting with space domain awareness technologies and investigating the radiation effects to NASA materials."

      The use of the Falcon Heavy and statements like that suggest that it's going into a high orbit, or an orbit with a high apogee anyway. That's a very different radiation environment than the ISS. It's possible they're testing some kind of shielding, just extending low orbit exper

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