Florida lands secret space plane

A secretive military space plane will move into a vacant former space shuttle hangar at Kennedy Space Center, Fla., possibly bringing hundreds of jobs. Using the Orbiter Processing Facility-1 will allow the Air Force's classified X-37B program to land, recover, refurbish and re-launch the unmanned system in Florida, according to Boeing, which built and supports the program's two orbital vehicles. U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson said Friday that the program would mean "hundreds" of jobs, first to renovate OPF-1 and then from Boeing's engineering, technician and support team. Officials did not say how soon the military program could move to KSC, which has been seeking new users for facilities it no longer needs following the shuttle's 2011 retirement. (Source: Florida Today, 01/05/14) Previous Gulf Coast note: NASA's Stennis Space Center, Miss., also offers unused/underutilized facilities for commercial use.