Blue Origin postpones historic crewed suborbital launch due to technical issue

​​​​​​​By Merve Berker

Blue Origin scrubbed its NS-37 crewed suborbital flight Thursday after detecting a technical issue during pre-flight checks.

The reusable New Shepard rocket was scheduled to lift off from Launch Site One in West Texas with six passengers , including aerospace engineer Michaela Benthaus, who would have become the first wheelchair user to travel to the edge of space.

“We are standing down from today’s NS-37 mission after the launch team observed an issue with our built-in checks prior to the flight,” Blue Origin said in a statement on its website.

“We are assessing our next opportunity for launch,” it added.

A live stream of the launch on Blue Origin’s YouTube channel also confirmed that “the launch team has decided to terminate today’s countdown.”

The company noted that updates on the revised launch window would be shared through official channels.

The NS-37 mission would have marked the 37th flight of the New Shepard vehicle and was anticipated as a landmark in accessible space travel.

Benthaus, who works with the European Space Agency, was paralyzed following a mountain biking accident in 2018.

“I thought my dream of going to space had ended forever when I had my accident,” she wrote on Instagram in August.

She had spent months preparing for the flight alongside a team to adapt the spacecraft for her participation.

Other crew members slated for the flight included engineer Hans Koenigsmann, entrepreneur Neal Milch, investors Joey Hyde and Adonis Pouroulis and self-described “space nerd” Jason Stansell.

New Shepard suborbital flights typically last 10 to 12 minutes and offer passengers a view of Earth from space and several minutes of weightlessness.