Military spacecraft ends two-year secret mission

UNITED STATES: A pioneering spacecraft belonging to the United States military has landed in Florida after completing a secret twoyear mission circling the Earth.

The experimental X-37B space plane produced a sonic boom that surprised residents along the Florida coastline as it prepared to touch down at the Shuttle Landing Facility at Nasa’s Kennedy Space Centre.

At 718 days, the mission broke records for being the lengthiest conducted by the US Air Force. The X-37B is one of two unmanned planes conducting such orbits.

The secrecy around the project has prompted much speculation, with some observers suggesting that the craft is some sort of space weapon.

But the air force has always denied this notion, insisting that it is testing technologies for future spacecraft travel.

The orbiters ‘‘perform risk reduction, experimentation and concept-of-operations development for reusable space vehicle technologies’’, the air force has said.

The Secure World Foundation, a non-profit group promoting the peaceful exploration of space, said the secrecy surrounding the X-37B suggests the presence of intelligence-related hardware being tested or evaluated aboard the craft.

The air force has refused to reveal the cost of the programme.

The office of the secretary of the air force heralded the landing of the X-37B plane yesterday as proof a major advancement in the project.

‘‘The landing of OTV-4 marks another success for the X-37B program and the nation,’’ said Ron Fehlen, a lieutenant colonel and X-37B program manager.

‘‘This mission once again set an on-orbit endurance record and marks the vehicle’s first landing in the state of Florida.

‘‘We are incredibly pleased with the performance of the space vehicle and are excited about the data gathered to support the scientific and space communities.’’

The vehicles resemble a miniature version of Nasa’s now retired space shuttles. The original Space Shuttle system had carried up to eight astronauts into low Earth Orbit. The shuttle would re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere upon completing its mission and land like a glider.

It was not without its dangers: in the course of 135 missions flown, two orbiters were destroyed, killing 14 astronauts.

These new aircraft are 10m long and have a wingspan of 5m, making them about one quarter of the size of the original shuttles.

A fact sheet for the vehicle states that the space plane is designed to spend up to 270 days in orbit at a time.

But so far several of the missions have much exceeded that limit. - Telegraph Group