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The Blue Origin ''New Shepard'' reusable launch system is a vertical-takeoff, vertical-landing (VTVL),〔 suborbital manned rocket that is being developed by Blue Origin, a company owned by Amazon.com founder and businessman Jeff Bezos, as a commercial system for suborbital space tourism. The New Shepard makes reference to the first United States astronaut in space, Alan Shepard. On 23 November 2015, after reaching altitude in its second test flight, the booster rocket successfully performed a powered vertical soft landing.〔〔 == History == A sub-scale demonstration vehicle made its first flight on November 13, 2006. the launch vehicle was to be assembled at the Blue Origin facility near Seattle, Washington. Also in 2006, Blue Origin started the process to build an aerospace testing and operations center on a portion of the Corn Ranch, a land parcel Bezos purchased 40 km north of Van Horn, Texas. Blue Origin Project Manager Rob Meyerson has said that he selected Texas as the launch site particularly because of the state's historical connections to the aerospace industry, although that industry is not located near the planned launch site, and the vehicle will not be manufactured in Texas. On October 19, 2012, Blue Origin conducted a successful Pad Escape at its West Texas launch site, firing its pusher escape motor and launching a full-scale suborbital Crew Capsule from a launch vehicle simulator. The Crew Capsule traveled to an altitude of under active thrust vector control before descending safely by parachute to a soft landing downrange.〔 〕〔()〕 In April 2015, Blue Origin announced that it had completed acceptance testing of the BE-3 engine that will power the ''New Shepard''. Blue also stated that they intend to begin test flights of the ''New Shepard'' later this year, with initial flights occurring as frequently as monthly. They "expect a series of dozens of flights over the extent of the suborbital test program () a couple of years to complete.〔 〕 The same month, the FAA announced that the regulatory paperwork for the test program has already been filed and approved, and test flights were expected to begin before mid-May 2015.〔 〕 The first flight of the ''New Shepard'' vehicle was conducted on 29 April 2015 during which an altitude of was attained. While the test itself was deemed a success and the capsule was correctly recovered via parachute landing, the booster stage landing failed because hydraulic pressure was lost during the descent.〔 〕〔 〕 In September 2015, a deal with NASA meant they would now launch from complex 36 at Cape Canaveral. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Blue Origin New Shepard」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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