[Satellites of the USA and China in the outer space with part of the Earth as background. Illustration of the concept of US-China competition in space technology] The New Space Race is gaining momentum, with an image of China's secretive spaceplane released by the U.S. shedding some light on Beijing's advancement in its space capabilities. A spaceplane is a vehicle designed to fly like an aircraft within Earth's atmosphere and function as a spacecraft in outer space. There are four known spaceplanes that successfully launched to orbit and returned to Earth – the U.S. Space Shuttle (retired), Russian Buran (destroyed), Boeing X-37, and China’s Shenlong.
We show the main point publicly. Create a free account to continue reading the full article, save it, discuss it, and connect it with market and OSINT context.