Blue Origin's rocket New Glenn launched earlier today from Cape Canaveral. Its seven powerful engines lifted the rocket into the sky.
New Glenn reached its planned orbit after the second stage's engines completed two burns. The Blue Ring Pathfinder satellite is now working well and sending data back. In the future, Blue Origin expects that the ability of Blue Ring satellites to maneuver to multiple orbits and locations, deploy and host payloads, and perform onboard computing and communications, will enable groundbreaking space missions.
Unfortunately, Blue Origin lost the booster, which was supposed to come back to Earth for reuse.
In a Blue Origin's press release, CEO Dave Limp expressed pride that New Glenn made it to orbit on its first try. He acknowledged that landing the booster was an ambitious goal but emphasized they would learn from this experience.
Reusing the booster is key to making space travel more affordable and sustainable. Each time a booster lands successfully, it can be refurbished and used again, cutting down the costs of building new rockets for every launch. This approach also speeds up launch schedules since preparation time for a reused booster is less than building from scratch.
A competitive race
New Glenn plays a crucial role in Blue Origin's plan for future space missions. It will help establish a human presence on the Moon, use space resources, and support Blue Ring for multi-orbit tasks. Future missions will send Blue Moon landers to the Moon, with NASA's Artemis program.
Blue Origin has more New Glenn rockets in the making and has orders for years to come. Their customers include NASA, Amazon's Project Kuiper, and AST SpaceMobile. They are also working to get New Glenn certified for national security launches with the U.S. Space Force.
Jarrett Jones, Senior Vice President for New Glenn, said this launch starts a new chapter for Blue Origin.
Blue Origin and SpaceX will be in a competitive race to innovate and dominate the commercial space industry. Both companies, led by Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk respectively, are striving to make space travel more accessible and cost-effective through reusable rocket technology. This competition drives technological advancement, reduces launch costs, and pushes the boundaries of what's possible in space exploration.