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Jeff Bezos's Space Company Reveals Some Secrets
An anonymous reader writes "Jeff Bezos's commercial spaceflight company, Blue Origin, has kept its plans secret to better compete with rivals such as Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic. But in order to build its launch facility in West Texas, it has revealed some details of its future operations: Blue Origin's Reusable Launch Vehicle (RLV) will carry three or more passengers on suborbital, ballistic trajectories to altitudes in excess of 325,000 feet above sea level. It will launch vertically and land vertically, and will use hydrogen peroxide and kerosene as propellants. It will operate autonomously under control of on-board computers, with no ground control. Blue Origin plans a maximum rate of 52 launches per year."
Jeff Bezos, the Amazon guy, has a space company? That's plenty of revelation for me!
☠
I don't know about this one. "Culberson County, we have a problem" just doesn't have a good ring to it.
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Is this actually a real venture or just a pipe dream to conveniently write tax dollars off against?
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
Any idea on how much tickets are going to cost?
I'll probably be modded down for this...
Look for life insurance policies to have a new clause added to explicitly exclude coverage in the event of a spacecraft mishap (if they don't already have such a clause).
The NSA: The only part of the US government that actually listens.
will use hydrogen peroxide and kerosene as propellants. It will operate autonomously under control of on-board computers, with no ground control.
No problems what so ever. Sounds incredibly safe to me.
I'm assuming they mean they're going to use 'chutes to land - landing on reverse thrusters or what have you in earth's gravity well could be fairly fuel expensive, and doesn't make much sense.
As long as the passengers after the flight are reusable too, it should be a workable, safe plan. However, could we claim spaceflights under the "Amazon Prime Plan", which claims "Unlimited shipping privileges cost just $79 per year"? After all, it all boils down to being shipped by Amazon.
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
Apparently, the interface for the vehicle will be a single button with the word "click" stenciled underneath it.
I'll turn into a supernova and burn up everything. Well I'll turn into a black little hole and you'll turn into string.
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I suggest a compromise with these "unmanned spaceflght zealots". We send each of them up in a manned spaceflight. At some pre-determined point, the spacecraft is programmed to become unmanned due to explosive decompression of the passenger compartment. Then, the flight continues on, unmanned. Everybody's happy.
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
As a public service, here are some facts about Culberson County, Texas.
* The county seat is Van Horn.
* As you can see by the satellite photo, the rugged Guadalupe Mountains meet the barren, flat Llano Estacado.
* Culberson County includes the highest point in Texas, part of Guadalupe Mountains National Park.
* Road geeks will appreciate the significance of this fact: Van Horn is the western terminus of U.S. Highway 90.
* Due to the lack of water, tourism and mining are the only sources of income. For details on how the county's 3,407 souls bide their time while waiting for the new spaceport to be built, see the Handbook of Texas Online.
And in the tongue-in-cheek words of singer-songwriter Brian Burns:
Welcome to Texas,
Don't anybody get me wrong;
We're glad y'all came to see us,
Just don't forget to go back home.
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.
Then, the flight continues on, unmanned. Everybody's happy.
I think something like "Nobody onboard would care." is more appropriate, but that's just me.
[...]would operate autonomously under control of on-board computers,
:)...
Didn't know anyone had systems relable enough for civilian passengers (i.e. not NASA, military, etc.) to do this yet (or maybe it's all in the disclaimer you have to sign beforehand
with no ground control during nominal flight conditions[...]
So they will have ground control during less than nominal flight conditions?
The NSA: The only part of the US government that actually listens.
Since the only real use for this sort of suborbital flight that isn't already adequately served by other methods (like high-flying aircraft) is tourism, unmanned flights wouldn't really work very well in this case.
"The TANG was stale"
"Space captain farted in airlock and refused to provide refund"
"Unsecured lunch lockers: tribbles ate my sandwich"
"I am a smoker, and was told that smokers had to step outside during spaceflight. Do NOT buy!"
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
at one launch per week, it wouldnt take more than a year or two to send prety much everyone i dont like into space. ^_^
I guess weekly launches aren't unattainable, as long as there's no requirement for an equal number of landings, and a large supply of launch vehicles.
S
I don't know. To me this is like the Wright brothers announcing their new airline and airport before ever flying at Kittyhawk.
jfs
The only thing worse than a Democrat is a Republican.
Would he have a one click launch sequence?
Would he patent it?
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
Would you take a ride on this thing?
The NSA: The only part of the US government that actually listens.
What about evasive evasive maneuvers? Ground clearance? and all the other details involved in space flight?
This thing is supposed to land vertically? That sounds more like a crash to me.
Will it have parachutes?
The Internet is full. Go Away!!!
"WTF do you want us to do about it, all the guidance computers are on your ship!"
Ironically, the word ironically is often used incorrectly.
You are going to have to have an awfully slick sales pitch to get over the fact that the flights always end with 600 mp/h impact at former Soviet Union strategic targets. Other than that, it's a great flight, man!
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
Crash? We prefer to refer to it as a high-velocity landing with 100% collateral damage to passenger, crew, and craft.
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
Approximately 1/3 of astronauts get space adaption syndrome. Basically, when you're in microgravity, the fluid in your inner ear doesn't settle, and so doesn't give your body a proper sense of balance. This does cause nausea and disorentation (lasting for up to a few days) in some people. Since these sub-orbital hops only give a few minutes of weightlessnesss, this will hopefully not be an issue.
The place looks close enough to Roswell.
Is there a secret meaning to Blue Origin?
Well, in a nutshell -
:)
The amount of GPE gained during an ascent requires X amount of fuel.
Descent requires no fuel to move downwards, however K.E. will be accumulated equal to the sum of the GPE and disippated thermal energy.
Therefore the amount of fuel required to stop a descent is less than that required to ascend.
To be honest, the best solution would probably be a combination of the two - drogue chute, main chute (both lightweight and easily re-deployable in future missions), which ensure a low velocity, and also proper alignment for the retro-rockets, which could be used for final touchdown (much like several mars missions).
And yes, I am a rocket scientist.
You're still in Texas. Sheesh! I though the idea was to escape.
Some mornings it's hardly worth chewing through the restraints to get out of bed.
Are they implying that this thing will be unguided? Just pointed at the sky and shot off without post launch guidance, like a bullet? That's what it sounds like to me, and would explain why ground control guidance is not seen as a problem: there's no way to guide it. It would be considerably cheaper to develop, but I'm not sure it would be too popular.
Another thing I'd like to know is, where does it land? If it's a water landing, that makes passenger safety and training more complex (they have to learn how to stay afloat if something goes balls up). If it's a land based touchdown, who's land is it going to land on? They'll have to buy a pretty big slab of dirt if they're going to guarantee it always lands on their property.
Neal Stephenson (Snow Crash, The Diamond Age, The Baroque Cycle, etc.) has taken a part-time job as a consultant for Blue Origins.
Don't blame me, I voted for Durga.
Not really on topic, or of any use whatsoever, but NASAs group life indurance policy (as of 10 years ago) actually did include loss of life due to space craft disaster.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
Well, yeah - the most fuel-inefficient mode would be to attempt to decelerate immediately after reaching your maximum upwards velocity - it's far more efficient to let gravity do the work for you... Apogee is only defined by the point at which your vertical velocity relative to the surface is zero, so apogee is effectively whenever you choose it. Attempting to slow at any point before apogee is, however, just silly.
"It will operate autonomously under control of on-board computers, with no ground control..."
This could certainly add new meaning to the phrase "Blue Screen of Death."
I'll wager that they'll never get guv'mint approval to operate without at least one human pilot.
Keep the peace(es).
Bruce Lane, KC7GR,
Blue Feather Technologies
Greetings, Professor Falken. Want to play a game?
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
In high power model rocketry, we call this condition "Shovel Recovery," and it's not pretty.
"The more corrupt the state, the more it legislates." - Tacitus
Jeff Bezos's commercial spaceflight company, Blue Origin, has kept its plans secret to better compete with rivals such as Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic.
Commercial manned space travel still seems like quite a lofty goal - lofty enough, and expensive enough, that trying to ensure competition in the marketplace at this very early stage seems counterproductive. One would think that everyone could benefit from open cooperation between Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic, at least until they both get a revenue stream going (read: customers actually in space).
Unless, that is, Bezos and/or Branson think the first-mover advantage will really translate into significant profits. I suspect, however, that those profits are in the pretty distant future, and the best way to bring the profits closer would be to cooperate.
You know, from what I hear, jet airliners basically fly themselves. It's not a major problem for a pilot to land or take off in one of these things, and once you get it up, it's basically cruise control. Of course, as they say, when you need an experienced airline pilot, there is no substitute.
What happens when something goes wrong? If this thing isn't built to have some human control when things are out of the ordinary, no one in his right mind would go up in one of these things.
(Just my two cents.)
quiquid id est, timeo puellas et oscula dantes.
The Wright brothers probably did not have to file environmental impact statements or calculate mean casuality per launch or estimate the damage of an explosion for insurance purposes or...
Jeff Bezos brought his evironmental impact statement to a conference once; it's about the size of a metropolitan phone book. It has sections that state that their rocket will not cause floods or hurricanes, will not change the flow of any rivers, will not interfere with the mating habits of local desert lizards, and on and on.
Present day aerospace development is regulated to the point of near inactivity. At least, the developers are still allowed to kill themselves in the process or nothing would get done.
On the upside, recent legislation has made launching easier. Finding a launch site with an appropriate window and a minimum of EPA hassles is still tricky.
-Hope
Both companies (virgin and blue origin) are run by people who have more money than they know what to do with... trying to create a new market is risky and expensive. To rich people it's gambling and that's exciting. To Aerospace engineers (like me) it's exciting to see people taking the initiative to try a new market, and do something that has been traditionally relegated to government contractors - the building of space hardware. Before the X-prize you (for the most part... there were some exceptions) had the little guys who built rocket engines in their backyard, and then you had Boeing/LockMart/Pratt&Whitney. Now you have middle ground, people who made their millions and can now risk to venture into captializing on space. Even if there is no response, there's bragging rights. An there will be a response, there have been numerous published and not so public studies stating that the market for suborbital tourism exists, even in the $100,000 range.
IAAAE (I Am An Aerospace Engineer)
-philski-
Were you never a kid? Have you never wanted to see the earth as a blue ball with a thin layer of hazy atmosphere against the black of space? Have you never wanted to experience serveral minutes of uninterrupted weightlessness? Lots of folks would love the chance to experience that. Unfortunatly probably only a rich few will have the chance at it from these companies.
You are so right. It is a very bad example, like "ape going ugly".
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
I can appreciate the gee-whiz factor involved in this - who *wouldn't* want to take a ride in a spaceship?
What I'm asking is this: besides being a *very* expensive roller coaster, what practical applications does this have right now? It would be great if there were somewhere for us to *go* other than up and then down.
The good news is that if/when we can live on another planet we'll know how to get there.
This is another common one in the feedback: "Aliens insisted on giving me anal probe". About half of these feedback listings are negative, and half are positive.
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
But, couldn't a launch accident involving hydrogen perozide render everyone within a 3-mile radius blond?
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
Send enough flights into space and EVENTUALLY one will come down profitably.