It’s been nearly 6 months since Blue Origin’s 23rd suborbital launch experienced an anomaly, and the company has finally released the results of its investigation. The good news is the escape function worked great! But there was definitely a nozzle problem.
The September flight, NS-23, was carrying a number of science payloads and no space tourists (let alone billionaires), so fortunately there was never anyone in danger. The anomaly occurred in the first ascent stage, triggering the abort process. The capsule separated from the propulsion module and deployed its parachutes, while the rocket fell to the ground.
Unfortunately this meant that the investigators had to reassemble the rocket to figure out what happened:
Forensic evaluation of the recovered nozzle fragments also showed clear evidence of thermal damage and hot streaks resulting from increased operating temperatures. The fatigue location o...
