'The largest windows in space':
Inside Blue Origin's New Shepard flight capsule that will take tourists to into orbit next year
- The New Shepard capsule's interior includes seats for six travellers and the 'largest windows in space'
- The capsule offers 530 cubic feet (15 cubic metres) of space for free floating and weightless somersaults
- Test flights of the rocket and capsule will begin this year with commercial flights set for 2018
- Launch system consists of a rocket and capsule that will fly passengers 62 miles (100km) above the planet
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| Blue Origin's rocket capsule |
Blue Origin, the rocket company owned by Amazon's Jeff Bezos, has revealed the first images of its reusable rocket capsule, due to take tourists to space as early as next year. This image shows the space capsule's 530 cubic feet (15 cubic metres) interior, with six seats each positioned by a window that the company says will be the 'largest windows in space'
The capsule is large enough for passengers to float freely and turn weightless somersaults.
They include reclining black seats with blue piping, and seats emblazoned with Blue Origin feather logo.
'In parallel, we’ve been designing the capsule interior with an eye toward precision engineering, safety, and comfort.'
Blue Origin's suborbital New Shepard launch system consists of a rocket and capsule designed to fly payloads and passengers to about 100 kilometres (62 miles) above the planet.
Test flights with crew members aboard are expected to begin this year.
The company has not yet set a price for rides, but says its commercial flight programme is on track to begin next year.
Every seat on the flight will have access to a large window, which the company says is made of multiple layers of fracture-tough materials.
Minimising distortion and reflection, the windows transmit 92 per cent of visible light giving them visibility 'as good as glass', according to Blue Origin.
The company has not yet set a price for rides but says it will begin commercial flights next year. The capsule's large windows (pictured) are made of multiple layers of fracture-tough materials. Minimising distortion and reflection, the windows transmit 92 per cent of visible light which gives them visibility 'as good as glass', Blue Origin claim
The system consists of a pressurised capsule on top of a reusable booster rocket.
The two vehicles launch together, accelerating for approximately two and a half minutes, before the engine cuts off.
The capsule then separates from the booster to coast quietly into space.
After a few minutes of free fall, the booster performs an autonomous rocket-powered vertical landing, while the capsule lands softly under parachutes, both ready to be used again.
Re-usability allows the company to fly the same system again and again.
Blue Origin's suborbital New Shepard launch system consists of a rocket and capsule designed to fly payloads and passengers to about 100 kilometres (62 miles) above the planet. The system consists of a pressurised capsule on top of a reusable booster rocket. Pictured is the exterior of one of the company's capsules
Blue origin's logo stitched into one of the leather seats in its New Shepard capsule. The capsule separates from the rocket booster to coast quietly into space. After a few minutes of free fall, the booster performs an autonomous rocket-powered vertical landing, while the capsule lands softly under parachutes, both ready to be used again
The company's capsule and booster rocket will be on show at the 33rd Space Symposium in Colorado Springs next week.
Earlier this month, Blue Origin unveiled how its New Glenn 'megarocket', which will be used to launch space satellites, will operate - and revealed its first customer.
The reusable rocket will be able to land on a drone ship, and is expected to blast off in 2021 with France's Eutelsat Communications SA as its first customer, Bezos said.
It will compete with Elon Musk's SpaceX Dragon Heavy, which is expected to send tourists around the moon next year.
Blue Origin's reusable New Glenn 'megarocket' is expected to blast off in 2021 with France's Eutelsat Communications SA as its first customer for satellite launch services, Bezos said
'We couldn´t hope for a better first partner,' Bezos said during a keynote address at the Satellite 2017 conference in Washington.
The target date for the first launch is around 2021, Eutelsat CEO Rodolphe Belmer said.
Terms of the contract were not disclosed.
Like New Shepard, the New Glenn booster is designed to fly itself back to Earth so it can be recovered and re-flown, slashing launch costs.
Tech billionaire Elon Musk´s Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, also favours this approach.
New Glenn will have about twice the lift capacity of SpaceX´s current Falcon 9 rocket, with the ability to put about 100,000 pounds (45,400 kg) into low-altitude Earth orbits.
Blue Origin will compete with SpaceX, as well as the United Launch Alliance owned by Lockheed Martin Corp and Boeing Co, Europe´s Arianespace and other companies, for commercial satellite launch business.
Jeff Bezos, founder of Blue Origin and CEO of Amazon, speaks about the future plans of Blue Origin during an address to attendees at Access Intelligence's SATELLITE 2017 conference in Washington
Eutelsat operates a fleet of 39 communications satellites launched by several companies, including SpaceX, whose launches sell for about $62 million (£50 million), the company's website shows.
'We think that our role as an industry leader is to stimulate competition so that there is a stream of innovation ... and that access to space is easier,' Belmer said.
'When the opportunity of ... New Glenn presented itself, we jumped on it.'
Bezos said his goal was to lower the cost of flights so that millions of people can live and work in space.
His vision is to shift energy-intensive, heavy industry into orbit and preserve Earth for human life, while Musk wants to colonise Mars.
'We couldn´t hope for a better first partner,' Bezos said during a keynote address at the Satellite 2017 conference in Washington. The target date for the first launch is around 2021, Eutelsat CEO Rodolphe Belmer said
Earlier this month Bezos revealed his space firm Blue Origin has finished building its first 'megarocket' engine.
The BE-4 engine will be one of seven powering the firm's New Glenn 2- and 3-stage rocket.
Like its predecessor the New Shephard and SpaceX's Dragon, it will be a reusable space vehicle with a first stage capable of returning to the launch site and landing itself upright after each flight.
The BE-4 engine will be one of seven powering the firm's New Glenn 2- and 3-stage rocket, which will have enough power to put heavy cargo payloads and astronauts into orbit around the Earth
Bezos, left and Musk, right are locked in a battle to create reusable rocket systems
The engine is a major step forward for the fledgling space firm
'1st BE-4 engine fully assembled. 2nd and 3rd following close behind,' Bezos tweeted.
The New Glenn itself is still years away from its maiden voyage, and the factory where it will be built is still under construction in Cape Canaveral.
The BE-4 engines will now undergo rigorous certification at Blue Origin's West Texas-based test site until the rocket is ready for its first tests in 2019
The BE-4 engines will undergo rigorous certification at Blue Origin's West Texas-based test site until then.
Earlier this month Bezos revealed what its first missions could be.
The boss of Amazon, says he wants to start delivering equipment to the moon to help set up the first human settlement.
The Earth-to-Moon cargo delivery service would carry as much as 10,000 pounds of goods to the Moon's South Pole and could be lifting off in 2020.
BLUE ORIGIN'S NEW GLENN
Blue Origin and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos unveiled the new rocket in October last year that will launch payloads and people into orbit.
Called 'New Glenn', this launcher comes in two stages that make it larger than SpaceX's future Heavy rocket.
'New Glenn 3-stage' is 23 feet in diameter and stands 313 feet tall.
And 'New Glenn 2-stage' is also 23 feet in diameter, but measures 270 feet tall.
Each stage lifts off with 3.85 million pounds of thrust from seven BE-4 engines.
Blue Origin has a range of rockets. As well as sending goods to the moon in 2020, the firm has also confirmed that it is still on schedule to send paying customers into orbit as soon as 2018
A single vacuum-optimized BE-3 engine, burning liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen, will power New Glenn's third stage.
However, the booster and the second stage are identical in both variants.
Blue Origin plans to fly New Glen by the end of the decade from Launch Complex 36 at Cape Canaveral, Florida.
The spacecraft come in two stages that are designed with half the power of Nasa's Saturn V launcher, and will bring Blue Origin one-step closer to its goal of 'millions of people living and working in space'. Bezos said the tests had validated the design
A second picture revealed the bottom of the rocket
It will mainly be delivering equipment that early moon settlers would need, he wrote in a white paper outlining his ideas.
Bezos has already reserved his parking spot near the Shackleton Crater on the South Pole.
It's a prime spot because it has constant sunlight and water nearby could be used as a source of hydrogen for rocket fuel, according to The Verge.
Jeff Bezos owns a private space company called Blue Origin which he hopes to use to deliver equipment for early settlers on the moon - it could be the lunar equivalent of Amazon Prime
The sunny spots of the moon are quickly becoming valuable real estate.
Shackleton Crater could be turned into 'an oasis of warm sunlight surrounded by a desert of freezing cold darkness' Nasa said.
Some experts believe that routinely parking a piece of equipment on one spot could mean they take ownership of that piece of land.
This cargo service would help to enable 'future human settlement' on the moon, Mr Bezos wrote in his white paper, which was obtained by the Washington Post.
'It is time for America to return to the Moon — this time to stay,' Bezos told Washington Post.
'A permanently inhabited lunar settlement is a difficult and worthy objective. I sense a lot of people are excited about this', he said.
This proposal came just days after Elon Musk said his company would fly two citizens around the moon next year.
This cargo service would help to enable 'future human settlement' on the moon. 'It is time for America to return to the Moon — this time to stay,' Bezos said
Rather than visiting and then leaving, Bezos' plans would mean actually leaving things on the moon for the first time.
He said the mission could only happen with partnership with Nasa.
'Our liquid hydrogen expertise and experience with precision vertical landing offer the fastest path to a lunar lander mission.
'I'm excited about this and am ready to invest my own money alongside NASA to make it happen', he wrote in the white paper.
With the help of Nasa, Bezos wants to develop 'incentives in the private sector to demonstrate a commercial lunar cargo delivery service'.
Just last month, Nasa's top staff were given instructions to assess the feasibility of sending humans to space with the first flight of the Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft.
The mission was originally designed to be uncrewed, and was set to launch in 2018.
In a press conference in February, officials leading the study revealed the evaluations are now well underway, and they've already created a 'hard, crisp list' of everything that will need to change 'from a hardware standpoint' in order to add crew.
Blue Origin space firm has confirmed that it is still on schedule to send paying customers into orbit as soon as 2018.
The company completed a crucial in-flight escape pod test on its New Shepard rocket in October last year.
'We're still on track for flying people — our test astronauts — by the end of 2017, and then starting commercial flights in 2018,' said Blue Origin President Rob Meyerson, speaking at the International Symposium on Commercial and Personal Spaceflight (ISPCS) in Las Cruces, New Mexico.
The company expects to build six New Shepard vehicles, which are designed to autonomously fly six passengers to more than 62 miles (100 km) above Earth, high enough to experience a few minutes of weightlessness and see the planet set against the blackness of space.
(The Mail, UK)
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