On Thursday (January 16), in the early hours of the morning, Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin’s giant rocket “New Glenn” successfully launched from Florida, marking its first space mission. This is the company’s first step towards competing in satellite launch business against SpaceX.
The “New Glenn” rocket, standing at 30 stories high with a reusable first stage, took off from Blue Origin’s launch pad at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida around 2 a.m. Eastern Time (07:00 GMT). This was its second launch attempt of the week, and amidst cloudy skies, the roar of its seven engines echoed loudly, heard several miles away.
As Blue Origin’s Vice President, Ariane Cornell, announced the successful entry of the rocket’s second stage into orbit, hundreds of employees at the company’s headquarters in Kent, Washington, and the rocket factory in Cape Canaveral burst into enthusiastic applause to celebrate this long-anticipated milestone.
Cornell stated during the company’s live broadcast, “We have achieved a key, important, top priority goal, which is safe orbit insertion, and we succeeded on our first try.”
She also confirmed that after the separation of the second stage, the rocket’s reusable first-stage booster was supposed to land on the drone ship in the Atlantic Ocean but failed to do so. The booster lost telemetry signal minutes after liftoff.
“We did in fact lose the booster,” Cornell said.
Despite this setback, as the culmination of a decade-long and billion-dollar research journey, this mission marks Blue Origin’s first foray into Earth orbit in the company’s 25-year history.
Before the first launch attempt on Sunday, Bezos told Reuters that he was most nervous about whether the booster would successfully land. However, he added that if they could achieve the milestone of delivering the payload into the intended orbit, a successful booster landing would be the “icing on the cake.”
The payload inside the “New Glenn” included the first prototype of Blue Origin’s “Blue Ring” spacecraft, a maneuverable vehicle planned to be sold to the Pentagon and commercial customers for national security and satellite service missions.
The rocket’s inaugural launch scheduled for Monday was canceled around 3 a.m. Eastern Time due to frozen propellant lines. The company stated that no issues arose before Thursday’s launch.
In the mission control room at Blue Origin located several miles away, Bezos monitored the launch wearing large headphones, surrounded by dozens of launch personnel, with CEO Dave Limp by his side.
It is expected that the “New Glenn” will continue to advance with dozens of missions worth billions of dollars, including up to 27 launches for Amazon’s Kuiper satellite internet network, competing with SpaceX’s “Starlink” service.
In recent years, with government and private companies advancing space programs, aiming to challenge Elon Musk’s SpaceX and its flagship product, the “Falcon 9,” the “New Glenn” has emerged as the latest rocket to compete vigorously in the United States.
NASA’s giant “Space Launch System” (SLS) rocket successfully debuted in 2022, while the United Launch Alliance, a joint venture of Boeing, and Lockheed Martin’s Vulcan rocket launched last year achieved success.
The carrying capacity of the “New Glenn” rocket is approximately twice that of the world’s most active “Falcon 9” rocket, with its payload fairing diameter also being twice as large, able to accommodate more batches of satellites. Blue Origin has not disclosed the launch pricing for the rocket, while the launch price for the “Falcon 9” rocket is about $62 million.
The development of the “New Glenn” rocket has experienced delays due to the growth of SpaceX as an industry giant. SpaceX is developing the large next-generation “Starship” rocket, expected to further shake up the industry by offering space travel at low cost and full reusability.
At the end of 2023, Bezos accelerated Blue Origin’s development, prioritizing the “New Glenn” and its BE-4 engine. He appointed Amazon veteran Dave Limp as CEO, with employees expressing that Limp brought a sense of urgency in competing with SpaceX.
(Adapted from reports by Reuters)