[Closed] Whats this mysterious plane up to?

Mind control experiments.

Launching satellites without having to use russian rockets

Launching satellites without having to use russian rockets

its up there for months and years at a time so its busy doing something other than just delivering stuff. But thats whats curious really if its up there doing 'stuff' why does it need to come back?

Fly?
It doesnt look like it would even get off the ground..

Seeding the clouds with cat aids.

running the mind control and hiding the remote down the back of the sofa by telekinesis

But thats whats curious really if its up there doing 'stuff' why does it need to come back?

coffee break
or
returning some valuable cargo

you decide...

hiding the remote down the back of the sofa by telekinesis

Not to mention evaporating one sock from every pair of half decent socks in the drawer.

Evil buggers.

Why are the boffins all in ebola suits? they never greet the shuttle like that.

An orbital bombardment/kinetic energy kill vehicle platform? Once serviced and refuelled it will be relaunched.

As for the hazmat suits, the rocket fuel is nasty stuff.

coffee break
or
returning some valuable cargo

you decide...

I decide? Hmmm its a tough one.

coffee.

no, cargo

no, coffee.

A cargo of coffee.

grrrrrr I'm so conflicted. I don't want this all this responsibility. I wish I hadn't asked now.

Wiki is pretty helpful and interesting
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_X-37

Unlike the Daily Heil, which suggests its mortgage, pension and child molestor control from space...

Or cat aids. Better get those Tin Foil Hats...

Mmmmm... Space coffee, just pass it through a cat and we've got us a business model.

Hypnotizing goats.

TBH I don't think it's particularly sinister or [i]"Top Secret"[/i], it's quite obviously a test vehicle/unmanned successor to the Shuttle, a two year in orbit and return mission makes quite good sense if you want to really examine the performance and robustness of systems and vehicles construction...

The shuttle's longest mission was about 17 days and most agencies tend not to recover satellites, space stations or other orbital kit once they've outlived their useful life, so conducting a prolonged orbital test of a bit of kit, then recovering it and being able to thoroughly examine it is quite a big deal for engineers, I doubt they're publicising the X-37-B's programme much because of the Shuttles big failures and the scrutiny surrounding it's safety during it's final few missions, NASA/USAF are probably quite cautious about the press now...

Two years is nothing, not when you think about how much Unmanned equipment has gone into orbit over the last 30 or so years, much of which the public don't know the details of...

For the Tinfoil hat brigade, the shuttle took at least eight classified payloads into orbit between 1985 and 1992 for the US DoD, you can only assume those are still up there scanning your brain and irradiating your scrotum from orbit...

I like the idea that it was spying on the chinese space station. Like, flying a spaceplane past every so often and looking in the windows is definitely how you spy on a space station

so conducting a prolonged orbital test of a bit of kit, then recovering it and being able to thoroughly examine it is quite a big deal for engineers

They sometimes do long term test on kit by bolting it to the outside of the space station.

Seems quite reasonable that the US military and aerospace industry want a means of doing this that doesn't involve being ferried up and back on Russian or European space craft and doesn't need to be manhandled by a lot of foreign astronauts.

There is some discussion that although the flight was quite well known about, its actual orbit was not known, and that people who'd looked for it hadn't been able to find it.....

Who said it hasn't been back....

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