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Fly to Space

New Shepard

Fly to Space

LATEST CREWED FLIGHT

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Meet New Shepard

All rockets take off; not all rockets land. Named after astronaut Alan Shepard, the first American in space, New Shepard is Blue Origin’s fully reusable, suborbital rocket system built for human flight from the beginning. During the 11-minute journey, astronauts soar past the Kármán line (100 km/62 miles), the internationally recognized boundary of space, experiencing several minutes of weightlessness and witnessing life-changing views of Earth. The vehicle is fully autonomous—there are no pilots.

A diagram of New Shepard showing the crew capsule hovering above the booster.

  • Crew Capsule

    Pressurized crew capsule with room for six people, environmentally controlled for comfort, and among the largest windows to have flown in space.

  • Ring & Wedge Fins

    Aerodynamically designed to stabilize the booster and reduce fuel use on its flight back to Earth.

  • Drag Brakes

    Deploy from the ring fin to reduce the booster's speed by half on its descent from space.

  • BE-3PM Engine

    Propels the rocket to space and restarts to uniquely slow the booster down to just 6 mph (9.7 km/h) for a controlled pinpoint landing on the pad.

  • Aft Fins

    Stabilize the vehicle during ascent, steer it back to the landing pad on descent, and guide the rocket through airspeeds over Mach 3.

  • Landing Gear

    Deploys for touchdown.

THE EXPERIENCE

The Capsule

Every astronaut has a window seat in the spacious and pressurized crew capsule. The cabin seats six and is environmentally controlled for comfort.

An interactive image of New Shepard's crew capsule highlighting features including the crew escape system, handholds to support movement during zero-g, large windows, and screens showing vehicle information during flight.
  • Among the largest windows in space
  • Reclined seats with 5-point harness
  • Crew escape system
  • Handholds for ease of movement during zero-g
  • Screen for in-flight updates and indicators
New Shepard's crew capsule descends under parachutes.

Safety

Our Highest Priority

New Shepard’s development flight test program concluded in 2021 following 16 consecutive successful flight tests, including three successful capsule escape tests, demonstrating that the crew escape system can activate safely during any phase of flight.

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Clint is harnessed to his seat inside the crew capsule looking jubilant as Earth and the thin blue line of its atmosphere is visible through the window next to him.

For the Benefit of Earth

Protecting Our Planet

Building a road to space starts with reusable vehicles. The New Shepard system has been designed for operational reusability and minimal maintenance between flights to decrease the cost of access to space and reduce waste. Nearly 99% of New Shepard's dry mass is reused, including the booster, capsule, ring fin, engine, landing gear, and parachutes. New Shepard's BE-3PM engine is fueled by highly efficient liquid oxygen and hydrogen. During flight, the only byproduct of New Shepard's engine combustion is water vapor with no carbon emissions. Read more here.

Payloads

Advancing Research

New Shepard payload flights support a wide range of research, education, and technology development. Human-interactive payloads extend the laboratory of space for real-world flight operations by adding skilled hands on board.

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