Blue Origin

Image via Twitter: @blueorigin

Watch: Blue Origin’s sixth successful booster flight [photos, video]

Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin launched its 12th crewless tests of the New Shepard rocket earlier this week. See the spectacular photos here.

Blue Origin

Image via Twitter: @blueorigin

Blue Origin’s suborbital rocket known as New Shephard reached an altitude of 105 kilometres on the day of the test. The spacecraft sucessfully crossed the internationally recognised boundary of space known as the Karman line.

Blue Origin’s purpose is to one day carry six astronaut passengers. The trip will last only ten minutes, but comes with a whopping price tag of a million dollars.

Blue Origin
Image via Twitter: @blueorigin

Blue Origin crewless test results

Testing of the rockets began back in 2015 and the one which undertook the crewless test flight on Wednesday 11 December 2019 had already completely five launches prior to this.

After the booster fired its engines, the spacecraft made a controlled landing back on Earth. Furthermore, the capsule was aided by parachutes as it floated in an upright position back down.

Watch: The New Shepard Flight Experience

The excitement was palpable when the New Shephard spacecraft made it back safely, with the team announcing on Twitter that the 6th consecutive flight was successful; and a new record, no less.

“Touchdown! The New Shepard crew capsule has successfully landed. […] This is the 6th consecutive successful flight to space and back for this fully reusable rocket booster.”

Twitter

View the live stream of the test flights here.

Blue Origin
Image via Twitter: @blueorigin

Partnering with NASA

Blue Origin recently teamed up with three other legacy space companies – Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and Draper – to pool their resources and produce a lunar landing system for NASA.

Moreover, the alliance is an indication of how ambitious NASA’s timeline is. Clearly, the companies must have come to realise that none of them will be able to provide the required crafts on their own in the allocated time.

Blue Origin
This still image taken from Blue Origin shows the sub-orbital New Shepard capsule as it descends in western Texas on 11 December 2019. – New Shepard, on it’s 12th test flight, carried NASA experiments, as well as thousands of handwritten postcards and artwork by children from Blue Origin’s nonprofit Club for the Future. Source: AFP Photo/Blue Origin

“New Shepard’s flight profile makes it an ideal platform for microgravity physics, gravitational biology, tech demos, art projects and educational programs. Earth, atmospheric and space science research are all possible on New Shepard.”

Twitter

Moon lunar lander design and function

Designed to deliver science payloads, moon rovers and potentially even astronauts to the moon surface, Jeff Bezos and Blue Origin’s Blue Moon lunar lander is understandably large.

Blue Origin
This still image taken from a Blue Origin video shows Blue Origin’s sub-orbital New Shepard capsule as it lands in western Texas on 11 December 2019. Source: AFP Photo/Blue Origin

Blue Moon shares a few design similarities with the Apollo lunar modules. Hwever it’s not hard to spot a few noteable differences between Blue Moon and NASA’s lunar predecessors.

Blue moon has an appreciably sleeker design and sports a substantial spherical fuel tank emblazoned with the words “Blue Moon” in big blue letters.

It is, in essence, a fully autonomous robotic spacecraft. The lunar is also equipped with a crane-like system capable of lowering payloads to the lunar surface.

Watch: The New Shepard Crew Capsule

Also read: Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin to team up with three other legacy space companies