Mini-Shuttle to Fly from Cape Canaveral

With every day drawing closer to the President arriving at the Kennedy Space Center and countdown clocks and launch campaigns underway for the so-to-be retired space shuttle Discovery and the new SpaceX Falcon 9, there is a new secret spacecraft ready to take flight next month from Cape Canveral as well. The USAF X-37B unmanned space plane demonstrator will make its first orbital launch boosted by at Atlas rocket, if secretive reports are correct.

As a mini-space shuttle, this Boeing Phantom Works craft has been under development for years. Several agencies have been involved in the effort, NASA as well as the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and various arms of the U.S. Air Force, reports Space.com.

The X-37 will test and validate technologies in the environment of space as well as test system performance of the vehicle during orbital flight, reentry and landing. Results from the X-37 will aid in the design and development of NASA's Orbital Space Plane - designed to provide a crew rescue and crew transport capability to and from the International Space Station, says NASA Marshall Space Flight Center.

NASA no longer has any near-future space plane plans, but the X-37B "reusable unmanned space test platform" project has been kept going by Boeing with Air Force money. Boeing have previously said that the USAF's objectives are "concept of operations development for reusable space vehicle technologies."

This vehicle has the potential to become United States' first operational military space plane, after the cancellation of Dyna-Soar in 1963 and similar to the old Soviet MiG-105 plan. The new mini-shuttle X-37 is expected to operate in a velocity range of up to Mach 25 or 17,500 miles per hour (28,163 km/h), capable of orbit, and conduct operations for up to 21-days.

Among the technologies to be demonstrated with the X-37 are improved thermal protection systems, avionics, the autonomous guidance system, and an advanced airframe. The on-board engine is the Rocketdyne AR-2/3, which is fueled by hydrogen peroxide and JP-8.

Similar programs by commercial launch firms such as a SpaceShipThree, SilverDart, the British Skylon. Government sponsored programs abound around the globe with the European IXV, a ESA-Russian Kliper, and India's Avatar.