Blue Origin's New Shepard rocket completed its 29th flight aiming to simulate lunar gravity for research payloads. Despite initial launch delays, the rocket ascended 105 km before returning, with one parachute failing but not affecting the landing. The mission emphasized the rocket's capability to spin the capsule for about two minutes at 11 RPM, simulating one-sixth of Earth’s gravity, vital for lunar technology testing. Phil Joyce highlighted this unique ability as essential for efficient and cost-effective research advancements as interest in lunar exploration grows, offering a more extended simulation than other available methods.
New Shepard's ability to provide a lunar gravity environment is an extremely unique and valuable capability as researchers set their sights on a return to the Moon.
This enables researchers to test lunar technologies at a fraction of the cost, rapidly iterate, and test again in a significantly compressed time frame.
Although a launch on New Shepard is not strictly necessary, approximately two minutes is possible on a New Shepard flight compared to seconds on parabolic flights.
The concept of spinning spacecraft to generate artificial gravity is not new; NASA considered it for Skylab and planned a centrifuge module.
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