Does US space plane X-37B mark start of new military frontier?
- The world’s only reusable space vehicle, the Boeing X-37B, returned on Sunday after 780 days in orbit, ‘providing a ride for small satellites’
- If the X-37B can be loaded with satellites, it can be loaded with weapons, observers warn
The weaponisation of space is becoming increasingly likely, following last week’s record-breaking test flight by the US Air Force’s X-37B space plane, military observers said.
The world’s only reusable space vehicle, the Boeing X-37B, returned to Nasa’s Kennedy Space Centre in Cape Canaveral, Florida, on Sunday after 780 days in orbit. According to the US Air Force, its mission objectives were completed successfully, including “providing a ride for small satellites”.
It was the unmanned space plane’s fifth and longest mission, raising the programme’s total number of days spent in orbit to 2,865. The air force is preparing to launch the sixth X-37B mission next year.
Compared to the space shuttle, the orbital test vehicle is smaller but flies for much longer, and appears to be dedicated mainly to military tasks.
Heather Wilson, former secretary of the US Air Force, said the X-37B’s strength was that it circles the Earth in “an orbit that looks like an egg”, and can manoeuvre when it moves close to the Earth’s atmosphere to change its orbit.