As we have explained on other occasions, the one known as X-37B is a military drone manufactured by Boeing and based on the X-37A space plane that Boeing and DARPA developed for NASA.
This spaceship to carry out secret missions has just broken its own record in its fifth mission.
In other words, the ship has spent more than 719 days in orbit around the Earth, although we know practically nothing of what it has been doing all this time abroad, since its missions are classified by the Air Force of U.S.
X-37B, a relatively small ship (8.8 meters long by 4.5 meters wide), broke the record set by the previous mission, OTV-4, which remained in the air for 717 days, 20 hours and 42 minutes
From the little we know: that this last mission was launched on September 7, 2017 through a Spacecon Falcon 9 rocket (and is still active).
Officially, and according to the Air Force, the main objectives of X-37B are to investigate technologies of reusable spacecraft for the future of the United States in space and conduct experiments that can be returned and examined on Earth.
The #X37B #OTV4 is the newest and most advanced re-entry spacecraft. Find out more about today’s landing here: https://t.co/GUGgOMQiYg pic.twitter.com/HfHHVnWhYc
— U.S. Air Force (@usairforce) May 7, 2017
Source: Gizmodo
