New Glenn blasts off
Blue Origin
Blue Origin’s reusable New Glenn rocket has successfully launched and reached orbit, though engineers failed to safely land the first-stage rocket booster back on Earth as hoped. Even so, the company’s first launch to orbit is a sign that Jeff Bezos’s space company is capable of challenging the current dominance of Elon Musk’s SpaceX in the private space launch business.
“I’m incredibly proud New Glenn achieved orbit on its first attempt,” said Dave Limp, CEO of Blue Origin, in a statement.
New Glenn, which is around the height of a 30-storey building, blasted off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida at around 2am local time (7am GMT). The rocket had seen numerous delays and setbacks, and a previous launch was abandoned when unwanted ice formed in some of the rocket engine pipes.
Around 13 minutes after liftoff, the rocket’s second stage reached orbit, which has been a goal for Blue Origin since the company was founded more than 20 years ago. It carried a test payload called Blue Ring Pathfinder, which is a collection of communications devices, power systems and a flight computer.
Another goal for this mission was landing its rocket booster on a floating landing platform in the Atlantic Ocean so it could be reused for future missions, lowering overall costs. However, engineers stopped receiving data from the booster shortly after liftoff. “We knew landing our booster… on the first try was an ambitious goal. We’ll learn a lot from today and try again at our next launch this spring,” said Limp.
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