The X-40A demonstrator has completed a series of seven approach and landing tests at Edwards AFB, Calif., as a precur- sor to first flight of the larger X-37, which is to begin final assembly this summer at Boeing facilities in Palmdale, Calif. The 22-ft.-long, unpiloted X-40A was drop tested at NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center facilities at Edwards over two months as a pathfinder for the X-37, which is to conduct its own series of five drop tests there next year from a B-52 aircraft flying at about 40,000 ft.
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