Planned Landing Had Been Set For Wednesday, No New Date Announced

When the Air Force launched it's X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle back in March, the mission profile called for the unmanned spacecraft to land 270 days later ... which would have been Wednesday, November 30th.

X-37B File Photo

It didn't happen.

The Air Force says it is extending the mission of the secretive autonomous spaceplane, but is not saying when they plan to bring the test vehicle back to earth. The Los Angeles Times reports that, in a statement, Lt. Col Tom McIntyre, the spacecraft's systems program director, said “We initially planned for a nine-month mission, which we are roughly at now, but we will continue to extend the mission as circumstances allow. Keeping the X-37 in orbit will provide us with additional experimentation opportunities and allow us to extract the maximum value out of the mission.”

McIntyre said the Air Force is "learning new things about the vehicle every day." It's overall mission is still not clear. The Air Force says it is strictly a test bed for other technologies, but some analysts have speculated that it could be the basis for an orbiting weapon that could be used against satellites, or as a space-capable bomber.

FMI: www.af.mil/information/factsheets/factsheet.asp?fsID=3466