Unmanned U.S. Air Force space plane lands after secret, two-year mission

This is the X-37B. There&#x27;s a contract for an X-37C, 1.8x as big and possibly capable of carrying humans.[1] That would be a nice little spacecraft. It&#x27;s time to get past capsules, without building something as big and fragile as the Space Shuttle. The USAF and Boeing aren&#x27;t saying much about it, though.<p>[1] <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.spacesafetymagazine.com&#x2F;aerospace-engineering&#x2F;spacecraft-design&#x2F;boeing-x-37c&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.spacesafetymagazine.com&#x2F;aerospace-engineering&#x2F;spa...</a>

Whatever the X-37B does, it seems to do it very well. This is its fourth mission.<p><i>Missions - that don&#x27;t need people - are the luckiest missions in the world..</i>

Surprised nobody&#x27;s mentioned this possibility as it usually comes up re: the X-37B. Terrifying but I think not out of the question given the strategic potential of such a weapon.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Kinetic_bombardment" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Kinetic_bombardment</a>

Why do the workers wear Hazmat suits in the image?<p>Maybe my interpretation is spoiled by all those sci-fi disaster movies and games and they are just wearing protective suits in case of fire etc.

If you read the jobs page at SRI, there&#x27;s a bunch of stuff about modeling microwave communications&#x2F;in the atmosphere&#x2F;for offensive cyber. I wouldn&#x27;t be surprised if this guy were involved in that sort of mission.

I like the semi-gibberish official explanation:<p><i>The orbiters &quot;perform risk reduction, experimentation and concept-of-operations development for reusable space vehicle technologies,&quot; the Air Force has said without providing details. The cost of the program is also classified.</i><p>How, pray tell, does anything &quot;perform risk reduction&quot;? Does that phrase have any meaning in English, or any other terrestrial language?<p>&quot;The cost of the program is also classified.&quot; - naturally! As someone much, much smarter than me noted, there&#x27;s very few real state secrets, but there&#x27;s tons of career-ending blunders, accounting mistakes, ridiculous overcharging and independent validation and verification companies that just happen to be owned by a distant relative. Those categories are not mutually exclusive.

So why are they publishing this super secret mission with photo containing people wearing hazmat suit? This doesn&#x27;t look like a leak, it&#x27;s full blown press release!

&quot;high-flying assets&quot;

so it&#x27;s a more serviceable alternative to a satellite?

Oh don&#x27;t let the F-35 people know about the space plane role or they&#x27;re going to add another 30 years and $2 trillion onto that program.

Anyone find it interesting that this thing is landing several days after a North Korean missile failed minutes into flight? Time to re-arm?

Two years would be plenty of time for a run around Mars or Venus, if it had enough propellant.

Secret rendezvous with Extra-terrestrials? Just kidding of course but was I the only one that had a flash for a great sci-fi plot?