Rocket Flies To Space and Lands Back On Earth!

[TIMELESS]

Blue Origin’s New Shepard space vehicle successfully flew to space, reaching its planned test altitude of 329,839 feet (100.5 kilometers) before executing a historic landing back at the launch site in West Texas.

 

 

I don't know what impresses me most, the fact that it actually landed back on Earth without problem (unlike Elon Musk's thing), or the fact that it actually landed where they wanted it too :lol:

 

Btw, the company that did this was setup by the same guy that founded Amazon.com, Jeff Bezos. It shows what money can do if you have enough of it :lol:

[Camel]

I read about this earlier today bit I thought it came down on a parachute or something else slow. Not like that. That's amazing. :eek:

 

Imagine being on board when it's hurtling back down to earth and then it slows down so close to the ground. Think I'd need some new trousers...

[CLR-GTR]

Small catch though, this thing didn't deliver anything into orbit, it went a lot slower than SpaceX which díd have to achieve that. Might be one of the possible causes making it a sliiiight bit easier, perhaps, maybe... Still a very nice achievement :D

[Camel]

It was just a test flight though. No point in putting millions(billions?) of £/$/€ on a flight that had a fair chance of turning into a firework or pancake when it landed.

 

I think they'll be sending unmanned experiments up in it next for the zero-gravity part of the flight before sending people up in the future.

[Ryzza5]

Elon also congratulated them, which was nice.

[TIMELESS]

Yup, just a step in the process. However it's still a pretty amazing feat, if they can fine tune it, the future looks bright for them.

[Eudemon]

That was amazing to see it come back. I mean that is the holy-grail of space travel at the moment that many are trying to succeed at. It was so weird watching it return, look as if it is going too fast and then it just lit up slowing itself down to a gentle final descent.

 

This was fully-automated too right? Watching it kind of dance about in the air and correct itself was quite something.

[Ryzza5]

I always thought the balancing tech was there (gimbals, etc) although countering freak winds may still be an issue. The big deal is precisely controlling individual rockets and them responding reliably.