Blue Origin identifies cause of New Shepard mishap
Posted: Fri, Mar 31, 2023, 7:20 PM ET (2320 GMT)
Blue Origin said March 24 that last September's New Shepard mishap was caused by a faulty engine nozzle. The company announced the conclusion of the investigation into the incident on the payload-only NS-23 flight, when an engine problem triggered the abort motor on the crew capsule, allowing it to safely land while the propulsion module crashed. Blue Origin said the engine nozzle suffered structural failure that engineers linked to changes in its cooling system that caused the nozzle to overheat. The company is making design changes to the nozzle and said it will resume flights "soon" starting with a reflight of the NS-23 payloads, but the FAA must first sign off on the results of the investigation.
