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Location | Van Horn, Texas, United States | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Established | 2004 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
Operator | Blue Origin | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Corn Ranch, commonly referred to as Launch Site One (LSO), is a spaceport owned and operated by Blue Origin which is located approximately 30 miles north of the town of Van Horn, Texas, United States.
The 670-square-kilometer (165,000-acre) land was purchased by Jeff Bezos in 2004.
The company uses the spaceport for testing and launch services for its New Shepard rocket. The launch site has a sub-orbital launch pad and also has a number of rocket engine test stands. The engine test cells are at the site to support the hydrolox, methalox and storable propellant engines that are used. There are three test cells for testing the methalox BE-4 engine, two of which support full-thrust and full-duration burns, and one that supports short-duration, high-pressure preburner tests. The spaceport also includes a vehicle processing facility and an astronaut training facility. [1] [2]
The companies first human spaceflight launched from Launch Site One (LS1) on July 20, 2021. The flight, dubbed NS-16, carried its founder Jeff Bezos, his brother Mark Bezos, test pilot and Mercury 13 member Wally Funk, and Dutchman Oliver Daemen on a suborbital flight aboard New Shepard 4. [3]
Current launch license and experimental permits from the US government Federal Aviation Administration authorize flights of New Shepard rockets. [4] The site became active on November 13, 2006 with the goal of providing commercial tourist flights to space. [5]
The launch pad is located at 31°25′23″N104°45′26″W / 31.422927°N 104.757152°W , about 2.9 km (1.8 mi) north of the check-out building. The landing pad is located at 31°27′06″N104°45′46″W / 31.4517°N 104.7628°W , about 6.1 km (3.8 mi) north of a check-out building and 3.2 km (2 mi) north of the launch pad. [1]
Van Horn is a town in and the seat of Culberson County, Texas, United States. According to the 2010 census, Van Horn had a population of 2,063, down from 2,435 at the 2000 census. The 2020 census results detailed a decline in population to 1,941. Van Horn's official newspaper is The Van Horn Advocate. The town is the westernmost incorporated community in the United States that uses the Central Time Zone, located on the same line of longitude as Cheyenne, Wyoming, and Colorado Springs, Colorado. Its earliest sunset in the beginning of December is the latest among incorporated towns in the United States, occurring no earlier than 5:56 pm.
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Blue Origin Enterprises, L.P., commonly referred to as Blue Origin is an American aerospace manufacturer, government contractor, launch service provider, and space technologies company headquartered in Kent, Washington, United States. The company makes rocket engines for United Launch Alliance (ULA)'s Vulcan rocket and manufactures their own rockets, spacecraft, satellites, and heavy-lift launch vehicles. The company is the second provider of lunar lander services for NASA's Artemis program and was awarded a $3.4 billion contract. The four rocket engines the company has in production are the BE-3U, BE-3PM, BE-4 and the BE-7.
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The BE-4 is an oxygen-rich liquefied-methane-fueled staged-combustion rocket engine produced by Blue Origin. The BE-4 was developed with private and public funding. The engine has been designed to produce 2.4 meganewtons (550,000 lbf) of thrust at sea level.
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Oliver Daemen is a Dutch space tourist who flew as part of the 20 July 2021, sub-orbital Blue Origin NS-16 spaceflight. At the time of his flight he was 18 years old, and became the youngest person, first teenager, and first person born in the 21st century to travel to space using the United States definition of the boundary of space. He is a licensed pilot.
RSS First Step is a New Shepard space capsule, built and operated by American spaceflight company Blue Origin. It is the third New Shepard capsule to fly to space, and the first to fly passengers. Its first flight was the NS-14 mission, which reached an altitude of 107 km (66 mi) on 14 January 2021.
Blue Origin NS-23 was an uncrewed sub-orbital spaceflight mission of Blue Origin's New Shepard rocket, which launched on 12 September 2022. The booster failed during max q about a minute after launch, triggering the launch escape system which removed the capsule from the booster. The capsule landed successfully, while the booster was destroyed upon impact with the ground.
Gary Lai is an American aerospace engineer. He was the chief architect for New Shepard, a vehicle developed by aerospace manufacturer Blue Origin for space tourism. On March 31, 2022, he flew on New Shepard's 20th mission to space, NS-20. He is a Co-Founder and the Chief Technology Officer of a company called Interlune.