Blue Origin launched a pair of suborbital New Shepard spaceflights on Nov. 22, carrying six people, including a pair of regular customers and a science communicator. The New Shepard spacecraft lifted off from Blue Origin’s launch pad in West Texas at 10:30 a.m. The flight was carried out according to schedule, without any delays in the countdown, as in previous flights.

New Shepard’s RSS First Step capsule touched down on its 11th flight, approximately 10 minutes after liftoff, or two and a half minutes after the launch vehicle touched down on its 12th flight. After the flight, Blue Origin said the capsule reached an altitude of 107 kilometers above sea level.

The NS-28’s six-person crew consisted of two people who had previously flown New Shepard. Husband and wife Mark and Sharon Hagley flew together in March 2022 on mission NS-20, the vehicle’s fourth crewed flight.

Also on board was author, television host and online science communicator Emily Calandrelli. In her social media post, she said she would be the hundredth woman to fly into space. But that number also includes nine women who flew Virgin Galactic’s suborbital spaceflights, which exceed the 50-mile (80.5-kilometer) altitude but fall short of the 100-kilometer Karman line used by U.S. government agencies to award astronaut wings. Uses Blue. Origin as the limit of space. Blue Origin didn’t mention the milestone when discussing Calandrelli in its launch webcast.

The other three people in NS-28 are Austin Litteral, who works in risk management in the financial industry and won his place in a competition on the online shopping platform; James (JD) Russell, technology entrepreneur; and Henry (Hank) Wolfond, chairman and chief executive of Canadian investment firm Bayshore Capital.

NS-28 is New Shepard’s ninth crewed flight and the third this year. This was also the second flight in a month, following NS-27’s uncrewed flight on 23 October. The mission was the first flight of a new crew capsule and launch vehicle that Blue Origin plans to use on future crewed flights to provide “expanded flight capability to better meet growing customer demand,” the company said at the time.