I've seen some "ho-hum" attitudes toward @blueorigin's upcoming 13th flight of New Shepard, on the 24th, at 15:00 UTC. I understand the frustration. Turtles and all that. But I still think New Shepard is a success and I'm eager to track its future. Why?

They have moved slowly. There has been just a single flight in the last 16 months of the system! But they are attempting to go from cargo to humans, and that's a big leap. So it takes time to work through those issues you didn't have to worry about with experiments.

I think they're getting there. And we really will see human flights in the not-too-distant future. I credit Blue Origin for not putting out false promises, and sticking with their "we'll fly when it's ready mantra." They've been working to make sure it's ready.

Now they may never make suborbital space tourism a mainstream thing, but if New Shepard works it is going to offer a fantastic experience at approximately 1/100th the cost of private ticket to space on an orbital spacecraft. That's a big cost reduction.

Finally, space tourism is just one aspect of New Shepard. The other part is that the company needed to learn how to fly, and develop a reusable rocket. By all appearances, that's just what they're learning so they can make a huge leap to New Glenn. So good luck tomorrow!