China's top-secret space plane just released another unknown object over Earth, raising concerns about exactly what the mysterious vehicle is up to. The clandestine spacecraft has now deployed at least nine payloads around our planet since 2022 — and we don't know what any of them really are.
The Shenlong, or "divine dragon," space plane is a reusable, robotic spacecraft that China has repeatedly launched into low Earth orbit (LEO) on board vertical rockets, before reentering the atmosphere for a horizontal runway landing — similar to the iconic spacecraft from NASA's now-defunct Space Shuttle program.
