Jeff Bezos’ ship, named for his mom, will no longer be used to catch rockets
One alternative to the big ship is to opt for an autonomous, seafaring platform or barge, much like the droneships that SpaceX uses to catch its rockets after flight.
Blue Origin wanted to catch the Jacklyn out in the Atlantic Ocean New Glenn rocket boosters. When a large first-stage booster that gives the initial thrust at liftoff expends most of its fuel, it is designed to detach from the upper stage of the rocket and make a controlled pinpoint landing on Earth, just as SpaceX already does with its Falcon 9. rockets.
Blue Origin’s website still references landing on a ship, rather than a barge, touting that it allows boosters to land in turbulent ocean conditions. Theoretically, a massive ship could sustain steady waters, allowing Blue Origin to carry out its booster retrieval operations in all types of weather.
Landing rocket boosters instead of discarding them in the ocean, as other rocket companies have done for decades, are at the core of SpaceX’s and Blue Origin’s plans to bring down costs and launch profitability.
Blue Origin’s New Glenn Rocket is planned to be the first of the company’s rockets that will be capable of reaching orbit, a trek that requires speeds topping 17,000 miles per hour. SpaceX has sent rockets into orbit since 2008.
So far, Blue Origin has only conducted flights of its much smaller New Shepard suborbital rocket. That rocket has been used to carry paying customers – and last summer, Bezos himself – on brief, supersonic joy rides that reach the edge of what is technically considered space.
New Glenn is not expected to carry humans, at least at first, but will instead haul satellites and other cargo to orbit.
Although already a couple of years behind its original schedule, Blue Origin is expected to launch the first New Glenn to orbit by the end of 2022.
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