US military’s X-37B robot spaceplane blasts off on secret mission aboard SpaceX rocket

Posted: 29th December 2023

Launch of plane, which will carry out classified experiments, marks another development in US-China space rivalry

Guardian staff and agencies

Fri 29 Dec 2023 03.17 GMTThe US military’s secretive X-37B robot spaceplane has blasted off from Florida on its seventh mission, the first launched atop a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket capable of delivering it to a higher orbit than ever before.

As on previous missions, there’s no one on board the reusable plane, which resembles a mini space shuttle and carries classified experiments.

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The Falcon Heavy, composed of three rocket cores strapped together, took off from Nasa’s Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral more than two weeks late because of technical issues.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2023/dec/29/us-military-x-37b-robot-spaceplane-spacex-falcon-hea…