The U.S. military’s classified mini space shuttle returned to Earth on Friday after circling the world for 434 days.

The space plane blasted into orbit from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in December 2023 on a secret mission. Launched by SpaceX, the X-37B vehicle carried no people, just military experiments.

Its predawn touchdown at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California was not announced until hours after the fact. Photos showed the white-and-black space plane parked on the runway in darkness.