U.S. spaceplane deorbits after classified mission and lands in California
CBSN
An unmanned spaceplane sent into Earth's orbit in late 2023 returned on Friday, landing at California's Vandenberg Space Force Base overnight, the U.S. Space Force said on Friday.
The X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle-7 was launched into space by SpaceX's Falcon Heavy for a classified, long-duration military mission for the U.S. Space Force on Dec. 29, 2023, CBS News previously reported. It was in high Earth orbit, or about 20,000 miles above the planet's surface, for 434 days. The test vehicle had no crew.
The U.S. Space Force said in a news release that the craft had "accomplished a range of test and experimentation objectives intended to demonstrate the X-37B's robust maneuver capability while helping characterize the space domain through the testing of space domain awareness technology experiments" while in orbit. One of those objectives included testing a new process called aerobraking, which saw the craft safely change orbit while using minimal fuel, the Space Force said on social media last month.
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