Blue Origin launched its 15th test flight of its New Shepard rocket that’s designed for space tourism flights, and surrogates for its first passengers did everything but actually fly on this trip.
The company founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos dubbed the NS-15 mission an astronaut dress rehearsal.
It lifted off at 12:51 p.m. EDT (11:51 local time) from the company’s West Texas launch facility on a 10 minute, 10 second flight. Once again, the booster made a successful return while the crew capsule hit its target of more than 100 km altitude and returned with a soft touchdown back at the facility. 100 km is known as the Karman line, which is the altitude that is internationally recognized as having made it into space.
Stats for the flight saw the rocket reach a maximum velocity of 2,234 mph (3,596 kph), and a crew capsule apogee of around 66 miles (106 km).
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Leading up to the flight, members of what Blue Origin calls the Crew Member 7 group, climbed up the gantry and took their seats inside the capsule, even having the hatch closed so they could perform a communications check.
“NS-15 is a verification step for the vehicle and operations prior to flying astronauts,” reads a post on the company’s website.
Crew Member 7 is made up of Blue Origin employees that will work with each group of space tourists for the flights, which can seat up to six.
The test group also, once the capsule returned to Earth in its parachute-assisted landing, climbed back inside the vehicle to rehearse a hatch opening and exit from the landing site.
For the actual flight, the company still used its human stand-in, named Mannequin Skywalker. And once again, the company flew thousands of postcards created by students as part of Blue Origin’s nonprofit Club for the Future, which looks to inspire youth into STEM careers.
The company had originally indicated it wanted to begin tourist flights into space in 2019, but has not begun to sell tickets nor set prices for prospective fliers yet, and then the COVID-19 pandemic put many plans on hold. Its last test flight was in January 2021.
When tourist flights do begin, the New Shepard capsule will send its passengers into suborbital space on about an 11-minute flight from launch to landing. The rides will allow passengers to unbuckle and experience weightlessness for a few minutes before strapping back into their reclining seats for the trip back to Earth.
With safety in mind, the capsule has an escape motor that is designed to propel the passengers away from the booster rocket, which like SpaceX’s Falcon 9 boosters, will be reusable.
While cost has yet to be set, media reports have suggested it will be close to the $250,000 price tag per passenger that’s been set by competing space tourism company Virgin Galactic.
Both Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin’s space tourism plans will let passengers see the curvature of the Earth on the short flights, and the companies then plan for quick turnaround to launch the next set of paying customers.
Blue Origin is also pursuing a larger rocket, the New Glenn, being built at its facility in Cape Canaveral and will be launched from the Space Coast.
