US Military Launches Secretive Robot Spaceplane on Possible Highest-Ever Orbit Mission

by Karen Faulkner, Worthy News Correspondent

(Worthy News) – Intensifying the US-China space race, the US Space Force on Thursday launched its secretive X-37B robot spaceplane aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket that is capable of taking it farther into space than ever before, Reuters reports.

Thursday’s launch from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida constitutes the X-37B’s seventh mission but, atop the SpaceX’s more powerful Falcon Heavy rocket, the US robot spaceplane may enter the geosynchronous orbit, more than 22,000 miles (35,000 km) above the Earth, for the first time, Reuters said.

Notably, Thursday’s launch took place just two weeks after China’s own secretive “Shenlong” robot spaceplane was launched on its third mission to orbit since 2020, Reuters reports.

In a statement about the US and China’s respective spaceplane missions, Space Force General B. Chance Saltzman told industry leaders last month: “These are two of the most watched objects on orbit while they’re on orbit. It’s probably no coincidence that they’re trying to match us in the timing and sequence of this.”

The Pentagon has given little detail about the X-37B mission, and has not stated how long the mission is to last, Reuters reports. However, in a statement last month the Air Force Rapid Capabilities Office said the mission would involve tests of “new orbital regimes, experimenting with future space domain awareness technologies.” According to Reuters, the mission “will presumably run until June 2026 or later, given the prevailing pattern of successively longer flights.”

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