The U.S. Space Force’s mysterious X-37B spacecraft is about to make its seventh flight.
The Space Force and SpaceX are “making final preparations” for the launch of the robot X-37B, scheduled for Sunday night (Dec. 10), Space Force officials said today (Dec. 7). ) said in an email update.
The spaceplane will be launched from the top of NASA’s Falcon Heavy rocket. kennedy space center In Florida, it will be held in a 10-minute window that opens at 8:14 pm ET (0114 GMT on December 11). If SpaceX webcasts the launch as expected, you’ll be able to watch it live on Space.com.
Related: SpaceX launches Space Force’s mysterious X-37B spaceplane on Falcon Heavy rocket
The Space Force is believed to have two X-37Bs in its fleet, both manufactured by Boeing. The spaceplane looks a lot like his old NASA space shuttle orbiter, but is much smaller. Both his X-37Bs could fit within the payload bay of one Space Shuttle.
The two X-37Bs have flown a total of six missions to date, each mission longer and more ambitious than the last. The newest one, known as OTV-6 (Orbital Test Vehicle-6), landed in November 2022 after orbiting the Earth for 908 days.
It is unclear how long the next flight, OTV-7, will last. The Space Force has released few details about the X-37B mission, as most of the X-37B’s payloads are classified. Some of this equipment could be new reconnaissance equipment. Military officials have long said the X-37B is used primarily as a test bed for new technology.
But the X-37B also transports civilian research cargo. For example, one of the unclassified experiments being conducted on OTV-7 is Seeds-2, a NASA project that tests how seeds are affected by long-term exposure to cosmic radiation.
The first five X-37B missions were launched on United Launch Alliance Atlas V rockets, and the most recent mission was flown on a SpaceX Falcon 9. OTV-7 will be the first mission to use the powerful Falcon Heavy.
Heavy has completed eight missions so far. The last launch, in October, sent NASA’s Psyche spacecraft toward the strange metallic asteroid of the same name.