The U.S. Air Force's first unmanned re-entry spacecraft landed Friday after a top secret mission in space, beginning in April. The Air Force will not say exactly what the plane's objectives were, but they say that it performs "risk reduction, experimentation and concept of operations development for reusable space vehicle technologies." It was most likely testing avionoics or reusable insulation. The newest reusable reentry spacecraft, the X-37B is planned to launch sometime next spring. It is designed for a vertical takeoff like a rocket to low orbits, where it can automously descend back to Earth on command and land horizontally on a runway, like a plane. This is the first craft since the shuttles to have this capability.
This technology is great. When the space shuttles are retired next spring, astronauts will need some way to get to the International Space Station. They will have to buy seats on Russian rockets, which is extremely expensive, until we come up with a replacement for the shuttles. The X-37Bs sound very similar to the design of the orbiters, but are automously controlled. Having the controls on autopilot makes the astronaut pilot's job much easier. It can make landings and dockings more precise, lessening the chance of error and calamity.
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