USAF X-37B Landing Slated for Dec. 3-6

The U.S. Air Force said late Nov. 30 that its first X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle, in orbit since April, is slated to land Dec. 3-6, depending on technical and weather conditions. “Preparations for the first landing of the X-37B are under way at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California,” according to a USAF statement. The 30th Space Wing will monitor the de-orbit and landing of the first X-37B, called OTV-1. The 11,000-lb. OTV-1 was launched on board an Atlas V 501 on April 22 (Aerospace DAILY, April 26). The goal of the program is to trim turnaround time between space flights from months to days, at a fraction of the cost of preparing NASA’s space shuttles for flight. Built by Boeing Phantom Works, the X-37B is 9 ft. 6 in. high, 29 ft. 3 in. long and has a wingspan of 14 ft. 11 in. Rather than hydrogen-oxygen fuel cells like the shuttle orbiters, the X-37B is powered by gallium arsenide solar cells with lithium-ion batteries. It is designed to stay in orbit for up to 270 days, deorbit itself and land autonomously on a runway. The X-37B first saw the light of day in the mid-1990s as a previously classified Rockwell project (hence its shuttle-like appearance) called Refly. It then became part of the Space Operations Vehicle (SOV)/Military Spaceplane project, which envisioned a reusable, suborbital, unitary vehicle (some designs were based on Delta Clipper, others on NASA’s abortive X-33) carrying one of three upper stages, all of which received X-series designators. The actual X-37 program was adopted by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and later transferred to the Air Force Rapid Capabilities Office, resulting in the current flight test. At the time of the April launch, Boeing said it plans to complete a second OTV for the Air Force with a launch scheduled for 2011.