suborbital

adjective sub·or·bit·al \ ˌsəb-ˈȯr-bə-tᵊl \

|Updated on: 20 Jun 2018

Definition of suborbital

1 : situated beneath the eye or the orbit of the eye

2 : being or involving less than one orbit (as of the earth or moon); also : intended for suborbital flight

Recent Examples of suborbital from the Web

Some of them are seeking to develop suborbital launchers like this, and the Base 11 prize seems likely to spur those activities further.

— eric berger, Ars Technica, "Rocket Report: NASA chief sort of endorses SLS; Russia woes; Virgin Orbit," 8 June 2018
On his own, Mr. Bezos has sold roughly $1 billion of Amazon stock annually to invest in Blue Origin, which hopes to start offering suborbital space tourism flights by 2019.

— andy pasztor, WSJ, "Jeff Bezos: ‘We Must Go Back to the Moon, and This Time to Stay’," 26 May 2018
OneSpace Technologies, based out of Beijing, launched its OS-X rocket from an undisclosed location on a suborbital trajectory on Wednesday, reaching a reported altitude of 25 miles and traveling about 170 miles before falling back to Earth.

— sean o'kane, The Verge, "China’s first private rocket launch kicks off the country’s commercial space race," 19 May 2018
Along with the suborbital New Shepard rockets and spacecraft, Blue Origin also is developing a powerful new engine, the BE-4, to help boost satellites into orbit using much larger New Glenn rockets.

— william harwood, CBS News, "Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin launches rocket in smooth test flight," 29 Apr. 2018
In November, space tourism and rocket engine company Xcor Aerospace filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy after development of its Lynx suborbital space plane proved to be more expensive and difficult than anticipated.

— samantha masunaga, latimes.com, "Entrepreneur seeks to boldly go where no one has gone before: 3-D printing nearly an entire rocket," 27 Apr. 2018
Like Blue Origin's suborbital New Shepard rocket, New Glenn is designed to be largely reusable thanks to vertical propulsive landings.

— jay bennett, Popular Mechanics, "Falcon Heavy for the Outer Solar System," 2 Mar. 2018
Blue Origin’s goal is to one day send paying customers on suborbital flights into space.

— alix langone, Fortune, "Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin Sees Another Successful New Shepard Rocket Launch," 29 Apr. 2018
In March, 2016, Jeff Bezos said the price would be competitive with other suborbital space flights.

— eric berger, Ars Technica, "New Shepard flies again, bringing suborbital space tourism closer," 29 Apr. 2018

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'suborbital.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.