Blue Origin reusable rocket launches into space, lands on Earth

“Full reuse is a game changer, and we can’t wait to fuel up and fly again”, said Bezos in a press release on Tuesday.

The company says its New Shepard rocket – named after Alan Shepard, the first American in space – carried an unmanned crew capsule just over 62 miles up before landing mere feet from the center of its launch pad in western Texas.

A rocket needs to be traveling about three times the speed of sound, or Mach 3, to reach space, but orbital missions require speeds about Mach 30, Musk said.

The aerospace industry for some time has been trying to design reusable rockets with an eye toward reducing expenses and increasing the number of launches.

Bezos announced the milestone with his first Twitter message following the launch and return of the rocket by his firm, Blue Origin.

But it was the rocket booster’s landing that prompted celebration at Blue Origin.

Previously Blue Origin has been seen as something of an also-ran in the space billionaires club, with its competitive acumen demonstrated more in the patent office than on the launch pad.

Musk also pointed out that there have already been rockets that went to the edge of outer space and landed on runways so they could be reused.

“The vision for Blue [Origin] is pretty simple”, Bezos said at a media event in September.

Blue Origin’s spacecraft New Shepard barrels back towards Earth, a faint white cylinder against a sky background. The hydraulically actuated fins ensured that the rocket was in position 5,000 feet above the landing site, braving high-altitude crosswinds of 119-mph.

With Monday’s successful launch and subsequent landing, we’re inching ever closer to a new era of space tourism.

Blue Origin’s competitor SpaceX has also built reusable rockets, but it has been unsuccessful in its two attempts to land them.

Musk congratulated Blue Origin and Jeff Bezos on their vertical takeoff and landing via Twitter.

But he added that “it is, however, important to clear up the difference between “space” and “orbit” and noted that any mission would need to achieve greater velocity for a true space mission.

And it seems that Musk has noticed, responding to Bezos’ tweet about the operation with a bit of been-there-done-that attitude.

To Bezos’ credit, New Shepard now holds the record as the suborbital reusable rocket that has traveled the highest and vertically landed in one piece.