A report published by China Aviation Journal, China has successfully launched its own space plane prototype, the news came out shortly after the US Air Force announced the successful test of their advanced X37B space plane, which is widely regarded as a next-generation super weapon that is even more dangerous than atomic bomb. This story has now been deleted.
Last year the X37 B was lost and found not once but twice by a South African amateur astronomer.
The Ming Pao and the Zhongguo Pinglun (China Review), a news website in Hong Kong, posted an article headlined “China succeeds in spacecraft test flight in tandem with U.S. X-37B” until early Tuesday, but no mainland Chinese media websites mentioned anything about it.
China’s “Hermes” Space Plane: A December 16 photo shows a model of the Shenlong and a new model of the Chinese “Hermes” space plane. China has made significant progress toward the development of an unmanned trans-atmospheric vehicle and a Space Plane. Beijing’s technological advancement has obvious commercial and scientific uses, however the military significance of the plane cannot be denied.
Hong Kong’s Ming Pao daily on Tuesday said Shaanxi TV last Saturday quoted acting provincial governor Zhao Zhengyong as saying China has “succeeded in the test flight of a prototype aircraft that can fly through the atmospheric layer.” Zhao was visiting a state-run aircraft corporation at Xi’an high-tech industrial development zone.
Chinese officials say that their rocket powered space plane program may be a reaction to U.S. ambitions to dominate space and develop space planes, hypersonic transports and bombers.
The involvement of fighter aircraft design institutes, plus previous statements of Chinese spacecraft design officials and related military-engineering literature, suggest that China wants its space planes to perform military, even attack, missions. The Chinese Daily said Beijing’s development of the aircraft was leaked to the press like recent stories about its new stealth fighter dubbed the J-20, but authorities were “deleting all Internet posts about the space fighter.”
The Chinese channel showed images of a prototype space fighter being assembled whose outward appearance was almost identical to a U.S. pilotless upper-atmosphere military spaceship, the X-37B, the daily said. The U.S.’ pilotless upper-atmosphere military spaceship, the X-37B /Courtesy of the U.S. Air Force.
Chinese military analysts clarify that a Space plane will definitely form the basis for a space combat platform. This space combat platform will be intended to attack targets on Earth or it could carry out counter-space combat missions. China is aggressively pursuing air-breathing hypersonic propulsion technologies, which will provide additional avenues to develop very rapid long-range “deep strike” weapons.
There are news stories about “People’s Liberation Army Air craft carrier space program in 2000″ which claim that China is also building a Spacecraft Carrier.
Russian researchers seem to be playing catch up, they are developing an unmanned spaceflight vehicle, something similar to the Boeing X-37 Orbital Test Vehicle, but its final use remains still unknown.
Oleg Ostapenko, Space Troops chief , revealed it also declaring that: “Something has been done along these lines, but as to whether we will use it, only time will tell”.
Does anyone remember Russia’s Shuttle clone? ;)
Great now these idiots want to start shooting at each other in space. If they are unmanned why don’t they save a lot of money and just play video games.
USA, Russia and China have hundreds of thousand of people staving why don’t they use the money to feed and take care of their country men???!
Ever the Jingoist?
The russians have been “there” long ago:
http://www.astronautix.com/craft/mig10511.htm
( and the US snitched some details for their X-* line
from it too.)
Thats the Buran. It never flew. As the Russians were a lot more practical and found out back then that it is not the most efficient way to get into space.
Shuttle clone?
Yeah right. Buran was a robotic shuttle which was more advanced than the US shuttle at that time. It could lift more to the orbit and bring more load back earth. Also would have carried 10 people instead of Shuttle’s 7. Besides the looks, there is no similarities between the two. Collapse of the USSR prevented further development. Learn the facts before making fun of something.
“Does anyone remember Russia’s Shuttle clone?”
I suspect the Chinese are a tad more serious about developing a working system than the USSR was. This is a weapon system, one of many they have in the works. Maybe it is another Buran, but I seriously doubt it.
I do. Buran, right? I recall that it was remotely controlled. A lot of people seem to have forgotten about it. As an example, I came across an article about stamps, and the author described a stamp featuring the Russian shuttle as depicting something fictional.
Too bad it was abandoned!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buran_(spacecraft)
Actually The Buran did fly once by remote control, it suffered Heat tile Loss and major Burn Thru Damage during re-entry on the Tail and Wings. This was brought up and mentioned several times during the Columbia investigation.
It was more advanced? But it never flew so who cares. I have a hypersonic bomber with laser weapons on my drafting table that is really advanced I just cannot get the $100 billion or so I need to develop it :)
Is this credible? Hmm, parts of this article seem credible and certainly China’s interest in this type of space tech is believable and proven but other parts of the article make this seem a bit stretched. I saw the X-37B in orbit (timed my viewing with heavens-above.com) and the amateur astronomers are really on their game now so it’s surprising that this was kept completely secret. Maybe they did launch something but didn’t put it in orbit.
It’s hard to say what a few things mean, with a language barrier and general ambiguousness – such as:
“China succeeds in spacecraft test flight in tandem with U.S. X-37B”
Well it wasn’t in tandem… maybe it means similar to.
“China has successfully launched its own space plane prototype, the news came out shortly after the US Air Force announced the successful test of their advanced X37B space plane, which is widely regarded as a next-generation super weapon that is even more dangerous than atomic bomb”
The X-37 isn’t a super weapon, is the Chinese version? Perhaps this means it’s the precursor to a super weapon – definitely has possibilities, but those likely won’t be realized for quite a long time yet.
“which claim that China is also building a Spacecraft Carrier”
What?? come on. Will this spacecraft carrier carry lots of smaller spaceships that are also speculated as being built? This could be a fancy future design thing but I’m pretty sure they aren’t building one right now.
The Buran flew once, successfully, two orbits, landing etc.
Buran flew into space only once, unmanned. It never flew again.
It never flew because the hanger “collapsed”. Remarkably convenient for the US, don’t you think? I mean, considering that the US also sabotaged Russian oil pipelines, effectively instigating the collapse of their economy?
Wrong. The Russian spaceplane is almost a direct copy of the American Dyna-Soar craft of the 60’s. The Russian design flew in the 70’s. So you’re saying the Americans time-travelled to get the design details from the Russians?
Hint: The Russians were big into copying American designs. The Buran was nearly identical to the shuttles.
love when people explain how much better a platform that never performed is/was than a platform that has performed for 20 plus years.
Kinda like those talking about how much the J-20, which won’t be fielded for years, is than fighters that are years ahead of it in testing or have actually been fielded.
too bad the russian mini space plane never went to space and seemingly just worked as an aero test platform.
and just because chinese gov. is deleting the information from where they can, it doesn’t mean that it exists – or that it could be put to 50km+ and back regularly, or to orbit and back – in which case they’d have a lot of business. and the military use scenarios are actually quite limited and such destruction achieved by other means as well. however, if you run a space program then it would be logical to have some plans for such plane.
Buran identical to US shuttle? Rubbish, you are showing your ignorance. Buran was outwardly similar to the US craft but the internals were totally of indigenous design and incorporated Soviet engineering practices of the times. Its NOT a copy, pure and simple.