The X-37B made its first flight in 2010 under great secrecy and spent a total of more than ten years in space on its first six missions.
A Falcon Heavy rocket from SpaceX was launched on Thursday evening to transport the American military space drone X-37B on a research mission, the US company founded by Elon Musk announced. After weeks of delays, the rocket lifted off from Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 8:07 p.m. (0107 GMT). The launch was broadcast live on the SpaceX website. No information was available about the destination of the space drone, an unmanned shuttle, for its seventh mission.
The Pentagon has released little information about the space drone and its new mission, which was originally scheduled to begin on December 7th. In its launch press release, SpaceX simply cites the codename the Pentagon gave the mission – USSF-52. “Falcon Heavy launched the USSF-52 mission into orbit from Launch Pad 39A,” SpaceX said. The Pentagon previously announced that the seventh X-37B mission would include “several cutting-edge experiments.”
“These tests include operating the reusable spaceplane in new orbital regimes, experimenting with future technologies based on knowledge of the space domain, and studying the effects of radiation on materials provided by NASA,” it said in a statement last month released statement by the Rapid Capabilities Office of the US Department of the Air Force.
Two weeks after China's Shenlong space drone was launched into orbit
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The X-37B was developed for the United States Air Force by United Launch Alliance, a joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed Martin. It is nine meters long, has a wingspan of 4.5 meters and is powered by solar panels.
The launch by the Falcon Heavy rocket comes two weeks after China put its own space drone, called Shenlong, into orbit on December 14 for what state agency New China described as a “certain period” to conduct scientific experiments “should provide technical support for the peaceful use of outer space.”