Blue Origin's third human spaceflight, first flight with 6 passengers.
- Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin canceled the launch of its New Glenn rocket during Monday's mission countdown, delaying the inaugural attempt to reach orbit and compete with SpaceX in the satellite launch market by at least a day.
- Blue Origin released a statement explaining that they decided not to launch as planned “to troubleshoot a vehicle subsystem issue that will take us beyond our launch window.”
- New Glen carries the first prototype of Blue Origin's Blue Ring Vehicle, a maneuverable spacecraft that the company plans to sell to the Pentagon and commercial customers for national security missions and satellite services.
Jeff Bezos Blue Origin A New Glenn rocket aborted its launch after “several anomalies” during the mission's countdown on Monday, delaying the inaugural attempt to reach orbit and compete with SpaceX in the satellite launch market by at least a day.
The 30-story-tall New Glenn launcher was positioned on the Blue Origin launch pad at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, ready for launch, originally scheduled for 1:00 a.m. ET (06:00 GMT), so from loading with methane and liquid oxygen. Propulsions
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But late in the countdown, Blue Origin pushed back the launch time and time again, nearing the end of New Glen's 4 a.m. launch window. A spokeswoman for a company live feed said mission teams were investigating “several anomalies.”
“We are withdrawing from today's launch effort to troubleshoot a vehicle subsystem issue that will take us beyond our launch window,” Blue Origin said in a statement. “We are exploring opportunities for our next launch attempt.”
Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket stands ready during its launch attempt, which was later delayed at least 24 hours, at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Cape Canaveral, Florida, on Jan. 13, 2025. (Reuters/Steve Nesius)
The delay could be at least 24 hours, but likely longer as the company investigates the problem for the high-risk mission.
The culmination of a decade-long multibillion-dollar development journey, the flight, whenever it takes off, will include an attempt to land the first stage of the New Glenn booster on a sea barge in the Atlantic Ocean 10 minutes after liftoff. While the second stage of the rocket continues towards the orbit.
“The thing we're most concerned about is the booster landing,” founder Bezos said. Blue origin In 2000, he told Reuters in a pre-launch interview. Obviously, on a first flight you can have an anomaly at any stage of the mission, so anything can happen.
Blue Origin's first Blue Ring vehicle prototype is a maneuverable spacecraft secured inside a New Glenn cargo bay, which the company plans to sell to the Pentagon and commercial customers for national security missions and satellite services.
A Blue Origin New Glenn rocket prepares for its inaugural launch from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Cape Canaveral, Florida, on January 11, 2025. (Reuters/Joe Skipper/File photo/Reuters)
Getting the spacecraft to its desired orbit in a rocket launch will be a rare achievement for it A space company.
“If we can do that, it will be a huge success,” Bezos said. Landing the booster would be icing on the cake.
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Development of New Glen involved three Blue Origin executives and faced multiple delays as Elon Musk's SpaceX became an industry giant by reusing the Falcon 9, the world's most active rocket.
Bezos moved to speed things up at Blue Origin in late 2023, prioritizing development of the New Glenn and its BE-4 engines. He brought in Amazon veteran Dave Limp as CEO, who employees said brought a sense of urgency. Competition with SpaceX.
New Glenn is more than twice as powerful as SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket and has dozens of customer launch contracts totaling billions of dollars.