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Six astronauts will be on board the manned mission
What’s the story?
Blue Origin, the space company owned by Jeff Bezos, plans to restart its space travel program after a nearly two-year hiatus. The cause of the outage was a liftoff failure that caused an explosion during an unmanned mission. A New Shepard rocket carrying a crew of commercial astronauts is scheduled to lift off tomorrow from Launch Site 1 in West Texas. According to Blue Origin’s announcement, the launch slot will open at 9:30 a.m. ET (7 p.m. ET).
Historic NS-25 mission carrying six crew members
The upcoming New Shepard 25 (NS-25) mission will carry six crew members, including 90-year-old Ed Dwight. Dwight was selected as the first black astronaut candidate in 1961, but he never had the chance to fly into space. The launch will be live-streamed on Blue Origin’s official website, making it convenient for viewers around the world to witness this historic event. This will be the company’s first crewed mission since the New Shepard rocket’s failed launch in 2022.
2022 New Shepard Breakdown Details
The suborbital tourism program was canceled in September 2022 after an unmanned New Shepard flight burst into flames about a minute after takeoff. The rocket’s booster exploded during the flight, and the capsule was abandoned while flying at approximately 1,127 km/h. The height is 29,000 feet. At the time, New Shepard carried 36 payloads, more than half of which were owned by NASA.
FAA Investigation and Blue Origin Corrective Actions
After the explosive launch, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) shut down the rocket and began an investigation into the flight failure. A year later, the FAA provided Blue Origin with a list of 21 corrective actions to take before the rocket was deemed fit to fly again. Blue Origin identified a “thermal structure failure in the engine nozzle” that caused thermal damage and hot streaks due to increased temperatures, which led to the rocket’s launch failure.
Successful unmanned flight paves the way for manned missions
Blue Origin recovered from its failure with a successful unmanned flight in December 2023. The NS-24 mission carried 33 research payloads, more than half of which were “developed and flown with support from NASA,” the company said. The successful payload mission paved the way for New Shepard to resume human flight and marked a recovery milestone for Blue Origin’s space tourism program.
