{"id":17240,"date":"2023-12-19T18:00:38","date_gmt":"2023-12-19T10:00:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/launch-success-brings-blue-origin-closer-to-resuming-crewed-suborbital-space-trips\/"},"modified":"2023-12-19T18:00:38","modified_gmt":"2023-12-19T10:00:38","slug":"launch-success-brings-blue-origin-closer-to-resuming-crewed-suborbital-space-trips","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/launch-success-brings-blue-origin-closer-to-resuming-crewed-suborbital-space-trips\/","title":{"rendered":"Launch success brings Blue Origin closer to resuming crewed suborbital space trips"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full-width\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"630\" height=\"397\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/231219-newshepard4-630x397.jpg\" alt=\"Touchdown of Blue Origin New Shepard booster\" class=\"wp-image-803910\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/231219-newshepard4-630x397.jpg 630w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/231219-newshepard4-1260x795.jpg 1260w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/231219-newshepard4-768x484.jpg 768w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/231219-newshepard4.jpg 1460w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 630px) 100vw, 630px\"><figcaption data-nosnippet=\"\" class=\"wp-element-caption\">Blue Origin\u2019s New Shepard booster touches down at the end of an uncrewed flight. (Blue Origin via YouTube)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Jeff Bezos\u2019&nbsp;Blue Origin&nbsp;space venture today sent its New Shepard rocket ship on its first suborbital trip to space in 15 months \u2014 and although no people were aboard the craft this time, the research mission boosted confidence that crewed flights will resume in the new year.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFollowing a thorough review of today\u2019s mission, we look forward to flying our next crewed flight soon,\u201d launch commentator Erika Wagner said as she wrapped up Blue Origin\u2019s streaming-video coverage.<\/p>\n<p>Her fellow commentator, Eddie Seyffert, said everything looked good during the 10-minute-long flight. \u201cI would call this the best day at work for me,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>The flight from Blue Origin\u2019s Launch Site One in West Texas followed the profile that the New Shepard program has used for 23 previous missions over the past nine years \u2014 including six crewed flights. Liftoff came at 10:42 a.m. CT (8:42 a.m. PT), and the rocket booster sent the capsule toward the 100-kilometer (62-mile) line that marks the internationally accepted space boundary. <\/p>\n<p>Capsule separation took place a little more than two minutes after launch. The reusable booster landed itself on a pad not far from where it was launched. Meanwhile, New Shepard\u2019s capsule rose to a height of 65.8 miles (106 kilometers) above ground level, and then descended to its own parachute-assisted landing in the Texas desert.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Blue Origin NS-24 New Shepard launch and landing\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/XXrcSok8XwM?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen=\"\"><\/iframe><br \/>\n<\/figure>\n<p>This mission, known as NS24, carried 33 science payloads in the crew capsule, providing a few minutes of zero gravity to study the effects on samples and hardware. It was essentially a do-over for a flight in September 2022 that&nbsp;ended prematurely&nbsp;due to a malfunction of the New Shepard booster\u2019s hydrogen-fueled rocket engine.<\/p>\n<p>As was the case today, no crew members were aboard New Shepard for that NS23 mission. No injuries were reported on the ground, and New Shepard\u2019s escape system worked as designed to push the capsule away from the booster for a safe landing. Nevertheless, the anomaly led to the suspension of Blue Origin launches and a yearlong investigation overseen by the Federal Aviation Administration.<\/p>\n<p>This September,&nbsp;the FAA closed the investigation&nbsp;and required Blue Origin to take 21 corrective actions \u2014 including a redesign of the booster\u2019s engine and nozzle as well as changes in procedures. Blue Origin began making the fixes even before the FAA issued the investigation\u2019s findings, setting the stage for NS24.<\/p>\n<p>An initial launch attempt on Monday was scrubbed due to a ground system issue that needed troubleshooting. In contrast, no major issues were reported today \u2014 although a couple of holds added a few minutes to the countdown.<\/p>\n<p>More than half of the science payloads that flew on NS24 were developed with support from NASA. Others were built by schools, universities and other education-oriented organizations. Among the reflown NS23 payloads were an experiment from&nbsp;Honeybee Robotics, a subsidiary of Blue Origin, which studied the strength of planetary soils under different gravity conditions; and a fuel cell that\u2019s being tested by Infinity Fuel Cells for space power applications.<\/p>\n<p>The New Shepard capsule also carried 38,000 postcards that have been submitted \u2014 on paper and&nbsp;online&nbsp;\u2014 by students through a&nbsp;program organized by the Club for the Future, Blue Origin\u2019s educational nonprofit group.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cA special thank you to all of our customers who flew important science today and the students who contributed postcards to advance our future of living and working in space for the benefit of Earth,\u201d Phil Joyce, senior vice president for New Shepard, said in a news release. \u201cDemand for New Shepard flights continues to grow&nbsp;and we\u2019re looking forward to increasing our flight cadence in 2024.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Blue Origin didn\u2019t immediately announce a schedule for future crewed flights, but the company has been making extensive preparations to resume flying people \u2014 and it\u2019s seeking to attract new customers. For example, an elevator was recently added to New Shepard\u2019s launch tower, supplementing seven flights of stairs.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe added the elevator to make New Shepard more accessible to people with disabilities, and more people in general,\u201d Blue Origin\u2019s Wagner explained. Seyffert said the change was the result of discussions conducted with New Hawking, a business resource group that deals with disability issues (and apparently takes its name from Stephen Hawking, the wheelchair-using physicist who died in 2018).<\/p>\n<p>Since mid-2021, 31 people \u2014 including notables such as&nbsp;Star Trek actor William Shatner&nbsp;and&nbsp;Jeff Bezos himself&nbsp;\u2014 have taken suborbital space trips without incident. Bezos\u2019 fianc\u00e9e, Lauren Sanchez, has said that&nbsp;she hopes to lead an all-woman space mission&nbsp;early next year.<\/p>\n<p>New Shepard\u2019s return to flight comes amid an organizational handoff at Blue Origin, with veteran aerospace executive Bob Smith&nbsp;passing the CEO reins to former Amazon executive Dave Limp. Bezos has said Limp will help him accelerate Blue Origin\u2019s progress in the year ahead \u2014 especially on development of the company\u2019s orbital-class New Glenn rocket.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Blue Origin\u2019s New Shepard booster touches down at the end of an uncrewed flight. (Blue Origin via YouTube) Jeff Bezos\u2019&nbsp;Blue Origin&nbsp;space venture today sent its New Shepard rocket ship on its first suborbital trip to space in 15 months \u2014 and although no people were aboard the craft this time, the research mission boosted confidence [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[509,1250,4402],"class_list":["post-17240","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-blue-origin","tag-new-shepard","tag-suborbital-spaceflight"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17240"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17240"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17240\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17240"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17240"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17240"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}