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Six astronauts took a brief trip to suborbital space on Blue Origin’s first crewed flight in two years.
While the previous mission, in 2022, went well, the company did an uncrewed research flight a month later which wasn’t so successful.
The unmanned rocket had an engine nozzle malfunction which caused the New Shepard capsule to abort and blast away from the rocket. It did parachute to a safe landing, but this hiccup meant the New Shepard had to be grounded while Blue Origin investigated and could fix the problem.
Blue Origin is the space tourism and exploration firm created by Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos. The New Shepard is a fully reusable suborbital launch vehicle designed to take tourists to and from space.
A couple of years on the seventh human spaceflight by Blue Origin has been completed. In total, New Shephard has flown 37 people into space.
On board, the NS-25 mission were Mason Angel, Sylvain Chiron, Kenneth L. Hess, Carol Schaller, Gopi Thotakura, and former Air Force Captain Ed Dwight.
Ed Dwight, 90, was selected by President John F. Kennedy in 1961 as the nation’s first Black astronaut candidate but he never had the opportunity to fly.
Ed Dwight moments after being in space on the Blue Origin NS-25 mission
Ed’s seat on the space mission was sponsored by a nonprofit organization. While the actual price of taking part in one of these missions is unknown, some reports suggest it could set people back around $500,000.
What is the New Shepard capsule that takes people to space?
The New Shepard is built for human flight and takes astronauts on the 11-minute journey that Blue Origin has just carried out.
It has a pressurized crew capsule that can fit up to six people inside and this returns separately from the rest of the rocket. It goes up with the rocket, but then separates and returns under parachutes.
Three parachutes are attached to the capsule, but only two were fully inflated on Sunday’s mission.
Featured Image: Via Blue Origin Press Release
