Space

Blue Origin's Crew Capsule 2.0 makes maiden flight

Blue Origin's Crew Capsule 2.0 makes maiden flight
Crew Capsule 2.0 made a successful first flight today
Crew Capsule 2.0 made a successful first flight today
View 12 Images
New Shepard Booster landing on the pad in West Texas after a successful Mission 7
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New Shepard Booster landing on the pad in West Texas after a successful Mission 7
New Shepard touching down
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New Shepard touching down
New Shepard reached a velocity of Mach 3.74
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New Shepard reached a velocity of Mach 3.74
Crew Capsule 2.0 made a successful first flight today
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Crew Capsule 2.0 made a successful first flight today
The only passenger on the maiden flight was “Mannequin Skywalker.”
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The only passenger on the maiden flight was “Mannequin Skywalker.”
Checking out Crew Capsule 2.0 after touchdown in West Texas
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Checking out Crew Capsule 2.0 after touchdown in West Texas
New Shepard Booster landing on the pad in West Texas after a successful Mission 7
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New Shepard Booster landing on the pad in West Texas after a successful Mission 7
New Shepard touching down
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New Shepard touching down
New Shepard reached a velocity of Mach 3.74
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New Shepard reached a velocity of Mach 3.74
Crew Capsule 2.0 made a successful first flight today
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Crew Capsule 2.0 made a successful first flight today
The only passenger on the maiden flight was “Mannequin Skywalker.”
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The only passenger on the maiden flight was “Mannequin Skywalker.”
Checking out Crew Capsule 2.0 after touchdown in West Texas
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Checking out Crew Capsule 2.0 after touchdown in West Texas
View gallery - 12 images

At 10:59 am CST today, Blue Origin's New Shepard reusable booster lifted off carrying Crew Capsule 2.0 for the first time. The rocket reached an altitude of 322,032 feet (98.16 km) in a flight lasting a total of 10 minutes and six seconds before returning to Earth for a controlled, powered landing.

Crew Capsule 2.0 is the latest experimental iteration of the capsule that will eventually carry passengers into space. It's notable for its large windows that measure 2.4 x 3.6 ft (73 x 110 cm), but on this flight the only passenger was "Mannequin Skywalker," an instrument-laden test dummy designed to return flight telemetry. In addition, the flight also included 12 commercial, research, and education payloads.

New Shepard touching down
New Shepard touching down

The flight, which was the seventh overall by the New Shepard reusable booster, saw the rocket reach a maximum ascent velocity of Mach 2.94 (2,000 mph, 3,200 km/h) and a maximum descent velocity of Mach 3.74 (2,847 mph, 4.582 km/h) on the way back to Earth.

The rocket deployed Capsule 2.0 at 6,463 ft (1.969 m) before it returned to the ground using its parachutes to land at 11:10 am CST. Meanwhile, the booster touched down after firing its engines at an altitude of 3,716 ft (1,132 m) to land at a speed of 6.75 mph (10.86 km/h).

Crew Capsule 2.0 First Flight

"Today's flight of New Shepard was a tremendous success," says Bob Smith, CEO, Blue Origin. "It marks the inaugural flight of our next-generation Crew Capsule as we continue step-by-step progress in our test flight program."

Source: Blue Origin

View gallery - 12 images
5 comments
5 comments
Derek Howe
awesome, can't wait until they have mastered this, and get the price of a short hop into space to be around a grand. Love the big windows, they are already way ahead of the Virgin galactic...which is glacial.
MK23666
Neat. Is there any reason why they don't land the booster in a shallow pad of water ... nevermind, cost I'm guessing.
BrianK56
6.75 mph landing sounds bone jarring.
YouAre
Keep wasting money, Jeff! You arn't alone, but your scale makes you the alpha!
warren52nz
MK23666 I don't think water would stay put under the rocket blast. It would just blow away. Good going Blue Origin. You make it look so easy! :-)