UFO'S of UAP'S, ASTRONOMIE, RUIMTEVAART, ARCHEOLOGIE, OUDHEIDKUNDE, SF-SNUFJES EN ANDERE ESOTERISCHE WETENSCHAPPEN

STS-39 Mission Specialist Charles L. Veach monitors an AFP-675 panel on Discovery's aft flight deck.

Credit: NASA

The space shuttle was NASA's primary option for transporting astronauts to Earth orbit between 1981 and 2011. The five shuttles that went into space flew 135 missions. Crews deployed satellites, conducted experiments and studied the Earth. A handful of the missions were classified, and little is known about these secret missions, even 30 years after the fact.

Joint operations

In the early days of the space shuttle program, some of the missions were run jointly by NASA and the military. This was in part because the National Reconnaissance Office had successfully requested the shuttle's payload bay — the part of the shuttle that carried satellites be carried into space — be enlarged to accommodate large military satellites, according to Air & Space Magazine.

NRO also wanted polar shuttle missions, since polar missions make it possible to see the Earth's entire surface below (as opposed to equatorial missions, which are limited.) The Air Force went so far as to create a launch pad in Vandenberg, California for polar-orbiting space shuttle missions, but after the Challenger incident, plans to use the pad were permanently mothballed.

After the Challenger disaster on Jan. 28, 1986, U.S. policy changed to allow the Department of Defense to use expendable, uncrewed rockets again. Classified shuttle flights continued with payloads that could not be shifted to the Titan IV rocket, the magazine added. The astronauts encountered considerable challenges in keeping information secret since the shuttle did not have secure information channels, and their movements and training operations had to be somehow kept separate in a normally open public agency.

Here is some of what we know about the missions with DOD.

STS-4 Columbia (Launched June 27, 1982)

The classified payload was known as Cryogenic Infrared Radiance Instrument for Shuttle (CIRRIS), which was supposed to test infrared sensors for a future surveillance satellite called Teal Ruby, according to America Space. The lens cap on CIRRIS failed to open, and the experiment failed. America Space added that Teal Ruby ended up being cancelled after the Challenger incident, which delayed shuttle flights by several years.

"Teal Ruby was first shifted onto STS-39 and finally cancelled," the publication said. "By the time STS-39 lifted off in April 1991, it carried not Teal Ruby … but an updated version of CIRRIS. Apparently, by the time it would have been ready to launch, the Teal Ruby technology — considered 'advanced' in the late 1970s — would be virtually obsolete, because sensor technology was advancing rapidly."

STS-51C Discovery (Launched Jan. 24, 1985)

Little is known about STS-51C's payload officially besides this terse line on the NASA website: "The U.S. Air Force Inertial Upper Stage (IUS) booster was deployed and met the mission objectives."

Multiple sources suggest that the satellite deployed was called Magnum/ORION ELINT, a signals intelligence program about which little is known. Before launch, no pre-flight commentary was available until nine minutes before liftoff — a first in the shuttle program.

STS-51J Atlantis (Launched Oct. 3, 1985)

Two Defense Satellite Communications System satellites were released on this mission, according to NASA. The system is intended to support secure data and voice transmissions for military users from across the globe.

STS-62A Discovery (Cancelled)

This mission was supposed to be the first one using the Air Force pad in Vandenberg, Calif., but it was cancelled after the Challenger explosion. Its main mission was to put Teal Ruby into orbit, according to NASASpaceflight.com.

STS-27 Atlantis (Launched Dec. 2, 1988)

It's probable that the crew released a satellite called ONYX, which had radar on board capable of observing targets on the ground through any kind of weather or cloud cover. According to Air&Space Magazine, one of the satellite's antenna dishes did not open and the crew possibly — although it's not confirmed officially — did a spacewalk to fix the issue.

STS-28 Columbia (Launched Aug. 8, 1989)

Air&Space Magazine reports that STS-28 hauled the Satellite Data System spacecraft into orbit; SDS was supposed to relay imagery from other military satellites. The magazine got confirmation on this from an Air Force officer, who was not named in the story.

STS-33 Discovery (Launched Nov. 22, 1989)

NASA's website simply says this was a Department of Defense mission. The payload has not been confirmed.

STS-36 Atlantis (Launched Feb. 28, 1990)

There are many theories as to what STS-36 carried, but nothing has been officially confirmed. The shuttle's ground track took it as high as 62 degrees, which is a record for the shuttle program.

STS-38 Atlantis (Launched Nov. 15, 1990)

NASA's website only says that this was a Department of Defense mission. No confirmed information about the payload is available.

STS-39 Discovery (Launched April 28, 1991)

The Air Force partially declassified this mission before launch. The unclassified payload was known as Air Force Program-675 (AFP-675), which was an updated version of CIRRIS. According to NASA, the classified payload "consisted of Multi-Purpose Release Canister (MPEC)," but no further information appears to be available.

STS-53 Discovery (Launched Dec. 2, 1992)

The main payload for this mission remains classified, with little information about what it could be.

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Hypersonic Flight Is Coming: Will the US Lead the Way? — **Artist's rendering of Lockheed Martin's SR-72 concept vehicle, which the company says could potentially fly six times faster than the speed of sound.**
**Credit: Lockheed Martin Corp.**

MOJAVE, California The world is at the start of a renaissance in supersonic and hypersonic flight that will transform aviation, but the effort will need steady commitment and funding if the United States wants to lead the way, congressional leaders and industry officials said at a forum late last month.—

"What's exciting about aerospace today is that we are in a point here where suddenly, things are happening all across the board in areas that just haven't been happening for quite a while," said former U.S. Air Force Maj. Gen. Curtis M. Bedke.

"There was a period where engine technology had just sort of stagnated — a point where all materials technology was going along at about the same pace," Bedke added. "There just wasn't much happening. But suddenly, in all sorts of areas that apply to aerospace, things are happening." [NASA's Vision of Future Air Travel (Images)]

Bedke was one of five panelists to speak Oct. 27 at the Forum on American Aeronautics here at the Mojave Air and Space Port. Sponsored by the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, the forum was hosted by committee chairman Lamar Smith, R-Texas, and member Steve Knight, R-Calif. Bedke, Smith and Knight were joined by David McBride, director of NASA's Armstrong Flight Research Center in California, and Craig Johnson, director of business strategy and development for Lockheed Martin's Skunk Works. Former Mojave Air and Space Port CEO Stu Witt moderated.

Knight has taken the lead on the House Science Committee in getting NASA's aeronautical program to focus on a new set of experimental aircraft. He said his passion for these programs isn't just about improving American aviation — it's personal.

"In 1967 was the last time we went hypersonic in an airplane," Knight said, referring to an X-15 flight piloted by his late father, William J. "Pete" Knight. That flight reached Mach 6.7 — 6.7 times the speed of sound — a record for piloted aircraft that still stands nearly 50 years later. (Hypersonic flight is generally defined as anything that reaches Mach 5 or greater. "Supersonic" refers to any flight that exceeds Mach 1.)

Since that time, the U.S. has conducted two unpiloted hypersonic research programs, X-51 and X-43. However, there was no continuity in the work, Knight said. [Going Hypersonic: Air Force's X-51A Waverider in Pictures]

"We collected an awful lot of data," he said. "But what I would like to see is that we can move that data into something, whether we are going to move into an aircraft that we're going to put people into or we're going to use it for some other program. We've got to have that continuity and move forward."

Knight noted that it still takes the same 4.5 hours or so to fly from New York to Los Angeles today as it did 30 years ago. Supersonic aircraft flights over land have been banned for decades because of the sonic booms they produce. No supersonic passenger planes have been in operation since the retirement of the Concorde in 2003.

NASA wants to change that. In February, the space agency awarded a contract to Lockheed Martin for the design of an experimental plane to test technologies that can significantly reduce the sonic booms caused by aircraft. If the program is successful, the ban on overland supersonic flights could be lifted.

"We're poised on the brink of a new era in air transportation," McBride said. "We do need to go faster. There is a market for supersonic flight over land in an efficient manner that can fly without being an annoyance to everyone on the ground."

NASA also is exploring ways to improve the efficiency and reduce the environmental impacts of subsonic aircraft. Engineers are experimenting with blended wings and other innovations.

Smith admitted that the difficulty that Congress and the president have experienced in passing budgets has caused problems in sustaining research.

"None of that is conducive to good work getting done in an efficient way," Smith said. "And we can do better. We need to get to the point where continuity actually lasts beyond just one administration, much less beyond tomorrow. And we're with you on that."

Bedke said there is no time to waste in moving these programs forward.

"It is inevitable that hypersonic technologies are going to happen," he said. "It is not inevitable that we are going to be the country to do it first. But we can be the country to do it first, but we're going to have to put our minds to it, and we're going to have to stop the history of fits and starts, of throwing money at a big program, achieving a wild success, and then having no follow-up. Or throwing a lot of money at too big a program, taking too giant a bite, failing miserably and then deciding hypersonics isn't going anywhere. Neither of those must be allowed to happen in the coming years."

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