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The US military's X-37B space plane landed at NASA's Kennedy Space Center on Sunday, ending its record-breaking 718-day orbit with a sonic boom during its first landing in Florida. The US Air Force has two X-37B Orbital Test Vehicles, which it calls its newest and most advanced reentry spacecraft. At 29 feet long and with a 14-foot wingspan, the planes are about one-quarter of the size of NASA's now retired space shuttles and have a cargo bay about the size of a pick-up truck's. The first X-37 program started in 1999, and the X-37B first flew in April 2010,...

Space station's air leak mystery deepensEquipment looks fine; no immediate danger, NASA says NASANASA astronaut Michael Foale and Russian cosmonaut Alexander Kaleri celebrated New Year's Day on the space station, then were notified Monday that the air pressure was slowly dropping. By Marcia Dunn Aerospace Writer The Associated Press Updated: 1:05 p.m. ET Jan. 09, 2004CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - An air purifier that was the prime suspect for a cabin leak at the international space station turned out to be airtight Friday as the crew widened the search for the mystery leak. The cabin pressure continued to slowly fall as...

Now the US wants control of space By Julian Coman in Washington (Filed: 08/06/2003) The United States is planning to take control of parts of space and develop patrolling military aircraft in orbit as part of a revived Star Wars proposal for an American military empire above the ozone layer. According to James Roche, the US Air Force Secretary, America's allies would have "no veto power" over projects designed to achieve American military control of space. The key theme of the ambitious plans is described as "negation" - the denial of the use of space for military intelligence, or other...