CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – Blue Origin launched its large new rocket on its first check flight Thursday, sending up a prototype satellite tv for pc to orbit 1000’s of miles above Earth.
Named after the first American to orbit Earth, the New Glenn rocket blasted off from Florida, hovering from the identical pad used to launch NASA’s Mariner and Pioneer spacecraft a half-century in the past.
Years within the making with heavy funding by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, the 320-foot (98-meter) rocket carried an an experimental platform designed to host satellites or launch them into their correct orbits. All seven fundamental engines fired at liftoff because the rocket blazed by way of the predawn sky, drawing cheers from spectators lining the close by seashores. Firm workers erupted in shouts and frenzied applause as soon as the craft efficiently orbit 13 minutes later, a feat that drew fast reward from SpaceX’s Elon Musk.
Bezos — participating within the launch from Mission Management — declined to reveal his private funding in this system. He stated he doesn’t see Blue Origin in a contest with Elon Musk’s SpaceX, lengthy the rocket-launching dominator.
He stood a lot of the time at his seat in Mission Management, wanting anxious and completely satisfied on the similar time.
“Congratulations on reaching orbit on the primary try!” Musk stated by way of X.
For this check, the satellite tv for pc was anticipated to stay contained in the second stage whereas circling Earth. The mission was anticipated to final six hours, with the second stage then positioned in a protected situation to remain in a excessive, out-of-the-way orbit in accordance with NASA’s practices for minimizing area junk.
The primary-stage booster missed its touchdown on a barge within the Atlantic minutes after liftoff so it may very well be recycled, however the firm confused that the extra vital objective was for the check satellite tv for pc to achieve orbit. Bezos stated earlier than the flight it was “a bit loopy” to even attempt to land the booster on the primary strive.
“What a unbelievable day,” Blue Origin’s launch commentator Ariane Cornell, stated.
New Glenn was alleged to fly earlier than daybreak Monday, however ice buildup in crucial plumbing brought on a delay. The rocket is constructed to haul spacecraft and ultimately astronauts to orbit and in addition the moon.
Based 25 years in the past by Bezos, Blue Origin has been launching paying passengers to the sting of area since 2021, together with himself. The brief hops from Texas use smaller rockets named after the primary American in area, Alan Shepard. New Glenn, which honors John Glenn, is 5 occasions taller.
Blue Origin poured greater than $1 billion into New Glenn’s launch website, rebuilding historic Advanced 36 at Cape Canaveral Area Power Station. The pad is 9 miles (14 kilometers) from the corporate’s management facilities and rocket manufacturing facility, exterior the gates of NASA’s Kennedy Area Heart.
Blue Origin envisions six to eight New Glenn flights this 12 months, if all the things goes effectively, with the following one developing this spring.
“There’s room for many winners” Bezos stated from the rocket manufacturing facility over the weekend, including that this was the “very, very starting of this new section of the area age, the place we’re all going to work collectively as an trade … to decrease the price of entry to area.”
New Glenn is the most recent in a sequence of huge, new rockets to launch in recent times, together with United Launch Alliance’s Vulcan, Europe’s upgraded Ariane 6 and NASA’s Area Launch System or SLS, the area company’s successor to the Saturn V for sending astronauts to the moon.
The largest rocket of all, at roughly 400 ft (123 meters), is SpaceX’s Starship. Musk stated the seventh check flight of the total rocket might happen later Thursday from Texas. He hopes to repeat what he pulled off in October, catching the returning booster on the launch pad with big mechanical arms.
Starship is what NASA plans to make use of to land astronauts on the moon later this decade. The primary two moon landings beneath the area company’s Artemis program, which follows the Apollo missions of the Sixties and Seventies, will see crews descending from lunar orbit to the floor in Starships.
Blue Origin’s lander, dubbed Blue Moon, will make its debut on the third lunar landing by astronauts.
NASA Administrator Invoice Nelson pushed for competing moon landers just like the technique to rent two firms to ferry astronauts to and from the Worldwide Area Station. Nelson will step down when President-elect Donald Trump takes workplace on Monday.
Trump has tapped tech billionaire Jared Isaacman to run NASA. Isaacman, who has twice rocketed into orbit on his personal privately financed SpaceX flights, have to be permitted by the Senate.
New Glenn’s debut was alleged to ship twin spacecraft to Mars for NASA. However the area company pulled them from final October’s deliberate flight when it grew to become clear the rocket would not be prepared in time. They may nonetheless fly on a New Glenn rocket, however not till spring on the earliest. The 2 small spacecraft, named Escapade, are supposed to examine the Martian ambiance and magnetic surroundings whereas orbiting the crimson planet.
___
The Related Press Well being and Science Division receives assist from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Academic Media Group and the Robert Wooden Johnson Basis. The AP is solely answerable for all content material.
Copyright 2025 The Related Press. All rights reserved. This materials might not be revealed, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed with out permission.
