We've all seen the pics from the Air Force's X-37B secret shuttle's return to Earth after a record-breaking 469 days in space Saturday morning. Now e've got some great thermal video of the robo-shuttle, officially known as X-3&B Orbital Test Vehicle-2 (OTV-2), landing just after Sunrise last week at Vandenburg Air Force Base on the California coast. Notice just how hot the nose section if of the little craft, as you can see from the video above, the heat-resistant tiles on the nose are charred white.
As is usual with the X-37B, we have no idea what the damned thing was doing up there. The first X-37B, OTV-1, is slated to be sent into orbit sometime this fall aboard an Atlas V rocket out of Cape Canaveral, Fl.
Click through the jump for more pics and the video.
