LAUNCH TIME | . - 15:30:00 - 18:00:00 |
LAUNCH PROVIDER | Blue Origin |
CUSTOMER | Blue Origin, NASA and some universities and schools |
ROCKET | New Shepard |
LAUNCH SITE | West Texas Suborbital Launch Site, Texas |
DESTINATION | Suborbital trajectory |
LANDING SITE | Blue Origin Landing Pad |
WEATHER | - |
Blue Origin will launch 36 small payloads from universities, private labs and government organizations aboard a New Shepard rocket.
The booster used for this mission (New Shepard 4) is the one that is also used in manned missions.
What's on board?
24 of the 36 payloads come from preschools, universities and private organizations focused on science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).
AMPES
Infinity Fuel Cell, in partnership with NASA's Johnson Space Center, will experiment with hydrogen fuel cell technology.
This technology could be used on lunar rovers and other surface equipment such as power tools and habitats.
The purpose of this flight will be to demonstrate the capability of the technology in microgravity.
BISS
The Biological Imaging in Support of Suborbital Science (BISS) experiment, developed by the University of Florida, was adapted for suborbital flight after it was originally designed to fly aboard the International Space Station (ISS). The main objective is to test biological responses to suborbital missions using the FLEX fluorescent imaging system.
ASSET-1
Honeybee Robotics' payload is ASSET, a test bed designed to study the strength of planetary soils, called regolith, under different gravity conditions.
ASSET-1 will be tested in microgravity to help determine the soil resistance of asteroids, for example. ASSET and its future iterations can also be used to study parameters such as particle sizes and different loading conditions. This experimental payload was developed by Honeybee Robotics, a company acquired by Blue Origin earlier this year and is funded by NASA's Flight Opportunities program.
Other relevant payloads
Other noteworthy payloads include: OlympiaSpace's ENGARTBOX, NASA Armstrong Flight Research Center's CFOSS, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory's JANUS-APL, Titan Space Technologies: T-2 Mission Arroway, and Create, LLC, and Dartmouth College: VARD .
A full list of the 36 payloads aboard the New Shepard rocket is available here.
New Shepard
THE SPACECRAFT
The New Shepard Crew Capsule has the capacity to carry up to six people in a large 13 cubic cubic meter pressurized interior. The main objective of Blue Origin is to open to the general public the experience of microgravity and the vision of the curvature of the Earth. Each large window can pass 92% of visible light despite its structural ability to hold pressure making the experience much clearer.
The public had a chance to see unique views of the people inside the capsule during New Shepard NS-16's first human flight. This is due to the presence of 12 indoor cameras with such exceptional HDR capabilities that both the interior and exterior of the capsule can be adequately exposed.
For safety, the capsule has an integrated solid fuel interruption motor known as the Crew Capsule Escape Solid Rocket Motor manufactured by Aerojet Rocketdyne.
THE BOOSTER
Named in honor of the first American launched into a suborbital trajectory, Alan Shepard, this rocket is designed for suborbital flights. Four New Shepard rockets have been built so far: NS1, NS2, NS3 and NS4. NS1 made its maiden flight in 2015.
The New Shepard booster is powered by a single BE-3PM liquid fuel engine with the capacity to produce 489 kN of thrust. The BE-3 is powered by liquid hydrogen (LH 2) and liquid oxygen (LOx) and was developed and tested by Blue Origin in the 2000s.
NS-21 will be the seventh flight of the NS4 rocket. NS4 has some improved accessibility panels for easier cleaning and hardware checkout. NS4 has already made five flights, in which it successfully landed together with the capsule. These tests gave Blue Origin and the FAA the confidence to fly humans on this booster.
The official live broadcast of the launch will start at 3.10pm (time subject to change).
// Sources: Blue Origin.