The air force’s mystery space plane is back on Earth, following a record-breaking two-year mission.
The X-37B landed at Nasa’s Kennedy space center in Florida early Sunday. The air force is keeping quiet about what the plane did in orbit after launching aboard a SpaceX rocket in 2017. The 780-day mission sets a new endurance record for the reusable test vehicle.
It looks like a space shuttle but is one-fourth the size at 29 feet.
Officials say this latest mission successfully completed its objectives. Experiments from the Air Force Research Laboratory were aboard.
This was the fifth spaceflight by a vehicle of this sort. No 6 is planned next year with another launch from Cape Canaveral. According to air force secretary Barbara Barrett, “each successive mission advances our nation’s space capabilities.”
