Jeff Bezos’s space-exploration company Blue Origin LLC achieved a key milestone: sending a rocket into space and then landing it safely back on Earth.
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The space vehicle reached an altitude of almost 330,000 feet after it launched from Van Horn, Texas, then made a “gentle, controlled” descent back to the launchpad.
A quick but necessary caveat (which shouldn’t take anything away from Blue Origin’s achievement): The reusability SpaceX is going for is more technically hard because the Falcon 9 has enough thrust to actually get into orbit.
The launch and landing of the New Shepard, as with much of what Blue Origin does, was done in virtual secrecy.
And yesterday, his space company successfully landed the first stage of its New Shepard rocket.
Musk offered a lukewarm congratulation to Bezos on Twitter this morning, calling the New Shepard a “booster” instead of a “rocket”.
Elon Musk has serious competition in the private spacecraft business. The company plans to try again on its next launch, perhaps next month.
Launch (11:21 a.m. on November 23) – New Shepard launches from the company’s West Texas launch site.
The landing was cheered as a momentous milestone in the history of space flight that could one day make human travel far more accessible and affordable.
As The Wall Street Journal notes, the rocket landed just four feet from where it took off at in West Texas.
The space capsule on the top of the rocket that will someday carry space tourists separated from the rocket once it reached space and returned to Earth via parachute.
This is the second full test of the Blue Origin New Shepard booster, which didn’t have a payload on-board this time.
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The video accounts for the rocket’s ignition, flight, and landing. It is also developing the BE-4 for its orbital booster and potentially United Launch Alliance’s Vulcan booster, which ULA hopes will replace its Atlas V rocket powered by Russian main engines.
