Post by ۞Quaalude™۞ on Dec 9, 2008 15:38:00 GMT -5
Eyes Only Secret # Secretive Space Vehicle Tested at Private Site
Blue Origin is developing a rocket-propelled vehicle that takes off and lands vertically , it's Cool That the secretive rocket work being bankrolled by billionaire Jeff Bezos of Amazon.com fame has shed some new light on its activities.
Blue Origin is developing New Shepard, a rocket-propelled vehicle that takes off and lands vertically and is designed to routinely fly multiple astronauts into suborbital space at competitive prices.
Flight tests of the suborbital craft have been staged at a private launch site in Texas.
Blue Origin is now noting that, in addition to providing the public with opportunities to experience spaceflight, New Shepard will also provide frequent opportunities for researchers to fly experiments into space and a microgravity environment.
To help shape this activity, the group has announced that interested parties should contact Blue Origin's independent representative for research and education missions, Alan Stern, the former NASA chief of space science.
These research and education missions are dubbed REM, oriented toward microgravity and space science investigations.
This activity would be in addition to, not in place of, Blue Origin's long-standing plans for human-carrying commercial flights. The first opportunities for autonomous or remotely controlled experiments on unpiloted flights could be as early as 2011 and the first ones requiring accompanying research astronauts would be available as early as 2012.
Coasting into space
In a mission overview, Blue Origin explains that the New Shepard vehicle will consist of a pressurized Crew Capsule (CC) carrying experiments and astronauts atop a Propulsion Module (PM).
Flights will take place from Blue Origin's own launch site, which is already operating in West Texas. New Shepard will take-off vertically and accelerate for approximately two and a half minutes before shutting off its rocket engines and coasting into space.
The vehicle will carry rocket motors enabling the Crew Capsule to escape from the PM in the event of a serious anomaly during launch. In space, the Crew Capsule will separate from the PM and the two will reenter and land separately for re-use.
The Crew Capsule will land softly under a parachute at the launch site. Astronauts and experiments will experience no more than a 6g acceleration and a 1.5g lateral acceleration during a typical flight. High-quality microgravity environments will be achieved for durations of three or more minutes, depending on the mission trajectory.
Call for investigators QC
www.space.com/missionlaunches/081208-blue-origin-stern.html
Blue Origin is developing a rocket-propelled vehicle that takes off and lands vertically , it's Cool That the secretive rocket work being bankrolled by billionaire Jeff Bezos of Amazon.com fame has shed some new light on its activities.
Blue Origin is developing New Shepard, a rocket-propelled vehicle that takes off and lands vertically and is designed to routinely fly multiple astronauts into suborbital space at competitive prices.
Flight tests of the suborbital craft have been staged at a private launch site in Texas.
Blue Origin is now noting that, in addition to providing the public with opportunities to experience spaceflight, New Shepard will also provide frequent opportunities for researchers to fly experiments into space and a microgravity environment.
To help shape this activity, the group has announced that interested parties should contact Blue Origin's independent representative for research and education missions, Alan Stern, the former NASA chief of space science.
These research and education missions are dubbed REM, oriented toward microgravity and space science investigations.
This activity would be in addition to, not in place of, Blue Origin's long-standing plans for human-carrying commercial flights. The first opportunities for autonomous or remotely controlled experiments on unpiloted flights could be as early as 2011 and the first ones requiring accompanying research astronauts would be available as early as 2012.
Coasting into space
In a mission overview, Blue Origin explains that the New Shepard vehicle will consist of a pressurized Crew Capsule (CC) carrying experiments and astronauts atop a Propulsion Module (PM).
Flights will take place from Blue Origin's own launch site, which is already operating in West Texas. New Shepard will take-off vertically and accelerate for approximately two and a half minutes before shutting off its rocket engines and coasting into space.
The vehicle will carry rocket motors enabling the Crew Capsule to escape from the PM in the event of a serious anomaly during launch. In space, the Crew Capsule will separate from the PM and the two will reenter and land separately for re-use.
The Crew Capsule will land softly under a parachute at the launch site. Astronauts and experiments will experience no more than a 6g acceleration and a 1.5g lateral acceleration during a typical flight. High-quality microgravity environments will be achieved for durations of three or more minutes, depending on the mission trajectory.
Call for investigators QC
www.space.com/missionlaunches/081208-blue-origin-stern.html