Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin targeting late spring for 2nd launch of powerful New Glenn rocket
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The second launch of Blue Origin's huge New Glenn rocket could be just a few months away.
The 320-foot-tall (98-meter-tall) New Glenn lifted off for the first time on Jan. 16 from Florida's Space Coast. The test flight was a success; the rocket's upper stage successfully carried its payload, a test version of Blue Origin's new Blue Ring spacecraft platform, to Earth orbit.
A secondary objective didn't go so well; New Glenn's first-stage booster failed to stick its landing on a ship at sea. (This was the expected outcome, the company had stressed; a successful touchdown on the debut flight would have been a pleasant surprise.) Blue Origin says it has homed in on the likely cause of the booster issue and plans to try again soon.
The booster's engines appeared to be performing well during the landing sequence, but "we weren't able to get everything right to the engine from the tanks. And so we think we understand what the issues are," Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp said during a talk on Wednesday (Feb. 12) here at the 27th Annual Commercial Space Conference.
He didn't identify those issues, describing them as "a combination of a couple of things." Blue Origin is making some changes to the second New Glenn booster to increase the chances of landing success, Limp added.
"The modifications are not complicated," he said. 'I don't think it's going to delay our path to flight. I think we can still fly late spring.'
Related: Blue Origin: Everything you need to know about the private spaceflight company
RELATED STORIES:
— Blue Origin fires up 2nd stage of huge New Glenn rocket ahead of debut launch (video)
— NASA delays ESCAPADE Mars launch on Blue Origin's giant New Glenn rocket to 2025 to avoid potential cost overruns
— New Glenn: Blue Origin's reusable rocket
Blue Origin still hasn't announced what payload(s) will fly on New Glenn's second launch, and Limp said the company is "still looking for opportunities."
"If it came to it and we just had to fly a mass simulator, we'll fly a mass simulator," he said.
The company views the first three New Glenn launches as developmental flights, he added, but has commercial customers for the rocket from Flight 4 onward.
New Glenn, which has been in development for about a decade, can carry 50 tons (45 metric tons) of payload to low Earth orbit (LEO). Its 23-foot-wide (7 m) payload fairing — the shell that surrounds and protects satellites during launch — is larger than that of any operational rocket.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Epoch Times
28 minutes ago
- Epoch Times
Who Is the Ex-NASA Nominee Pushed to Spotlight by Musk-Trump Spat
Jared Isaacman, a billionaire entrepreneur and formerly the nominee for President Donald Trump's NASA Administrator, has received scrutiny over his past donations amid growing public tensions between Trump and Elon Musk. Trump highlighted Isaacman's past donations—which In announcing the decision last week, Trump cited a 'thorough review of prior associations' and said that he would nominate an individual who would put 'America First in Space.' Isaacman had been suggested for the top space position by Musk, who heads SpaceX, the world's most valuable private space company. Isaacman helmed several spaceflight missions operated SpaceX, including the 2021 Inspiration4 and the 2024 Polaris Dawn, where he participated in the first private spacewalk. Isaacman accumulated his wealth through Shift4 Payments, the payment processing company he founded in his parents' house at age 16. He is also the founder of Draken International, an aerospace defense contractor. Trump has highlighted the fact that Musk knew Isaacman 'very well,' but said that Isaacman was a 'Democrat,' and that his nomination was 'inappropriate.' 'He happened to be a Democrat—like, totally Democrat,' Trump said. 'I say, you know, look, we won. We get certain privileges, and one of the privileges is we don't have to appoint a Democrat,' Trump told reporters last week. The NASA logo in the Webb Auditorium at NASA headquarters in Washington, DC, on June 7, 2022. STEFANI REYNOLDS/AFP via Getty Images A senior administration official told The Epoch Times, that Isaacman's nomination wasn't pulled because of Musk and that other administration officials and nominees suggested by Musk aren't affected. 'Jared Isaacman should have never been picked,' said the senior administration official, speaking on the condition of anonymity. In a June 4 podcast 'I want to be overwhelmingly clear. I don't fault the President at all. I fully support him,' Isaacman said. Isaacman did not immediately respond to a request for comment by The Epoch Times. President Donald Trump delivers remarks at the U.S. Steel Corporation – Irvin Works in West Mifflin, Pa., on May 30, 2025. Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times Speaking of his nomination interview, he praised Trump for a depth of knowledge about the space program and China. 'The President was incredibly knowledgeable. I was impressed,' he said, noting they spoke a lot about the Chinese Air Force. After leaving the Trump administration as a special employee last week, Musk has criticized the Republicans' One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which the president endorsed, over its potential fiscal impact on the federal government, calling the tax and spending package an 'abomination.' Trump has since threatened to pull federal subsidies and contracts for Musk's companies, saying it would be the 'easiest way to save money in our Budget, Billions and Billions of Dollars.' Musk is the CEO of spacecraft manufacturer SpaceX and electric vehicle maker Tesla.
Yahoo
37 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Tesla share plunge amid Trump feud wipes $152bn off Elon Musk's company
Tesla's shares dropped by about 14.2% on Thursday at market close, wiping roughly $152bn off the value of the company as a feud between Elon Musk and Donald Trump erupted into public view. The former political allies traded threats and insults through posts on their respective social media platforms throughout the afternoon as the company's price fell. Trump suggested on Truth Social that he could cut Musk's government subsidies and contracts, of which both Tesla and SpaceX have been immense beneficiaries. Musk meanwhile threatened to decommission the SpaceX spacecraft that Nasa relies on for transport missions, called for Trump's impeachment, derided the president's signature tariffs and accused him of being affiliated with the notorious sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Musk said late on Thursday evening his company would not decommission its spacecraft. The decline in Tesla's share price on Thursday knocked about $8.73bn off Musk's total net worth, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. The reported $152bn drop also decreased the value of the company to roughly $900bn. Related: Musk calls for Trump to be impeached as extraordinary feud escalates Tesla has struggled throughout the year amid declining sales and buyers around the world rejecting the automaker due to Musk's association with far-right politics. Stock traders who had shorted Tesla shares made billions amid the spat, per the Wall Street Journal. The blow-up is an unexpected and dramatic escalation of a growing rift between two of the world's most powerful men. Musk had donated about $275m to Trump's 2024 presidential campaign and served as the leader of the cost-cutting 'department of government efficiency' (Doge) for months at the president's beck and call. It also puts increased investor scrutiny on how the clash could affect Musk's business empire, with his companies such as Tesla facing potential retribution in the form of canceled government deals or increased regulatory oversight. Interactive The rift began after Musk recently opposed the administration's new tax bill that eliminates electric vehicle tax credits and would add an expected $2.3tn to the deficit, in effect nullifying the limited 'savings' Doge claimed to find. Musk was also reportedly upset about being increasingly iced out of the Trump administration and having the nomination of his preferred candidate to lead Nasa pulled. Musk and Trump's feud also comes at a particularly sensitive time for Tesla as it seeks to build a self-driving robotaxi, set to debut in Austin next week. Musk has hinged the company's future on the product, but it will depend on approval from government regulators to ever become commercially viable. Meanwhile, shares in the US president's Truth Social platform parent company, Trump Media & Technology Group, had fallen by 8% at close of trading on Thursday. And the meme cryptocurrency $Trump, backed by Trump, sank 12%. Eyes were on the markets early on Friday to see if the stocks would bounce back on the prospect of a truce between Trump and Musk. Joanna Walters contributed reporting
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Trump-Musk showdown threatens US space plans
SpaceX's rockets ferry US astronauts to the International Space Station. Its Starlink satellite constellation blankets the globe with broadband, and the company is embedded in some of the Pentagon's most sensitive projects, including tracking hypersonic missiles. So when President Donald Trump threatened on Thursday to cancel Elon Musk's federal contracts, space watchers snapped to attention. Musk, the world's richest person, shot back that he would mothball Dragon -- the capsule NASA relies on for crew flights -- before retracting the threat a few hours later. For now, experts say mutual dependence should keep a full-blown rupture at bay, but the episode exposes just how disruptive any break could be. Founded in 2002, SpaceX leapfrogged legacy contractors to become the world's dominant launch provider. Driven by Musk's ambition to make humanity multiplanetary, it is now NASA's sole means of sending astronauts to the ISS -- a symbol of post–Cold War cooperation and a testbed for deeper space missions. - Space monopoly? - The company has completed 10 regular crew rotations to the orbiting lab and is contracted for four more, under a deal worth nearly $5 billion. That's just part of a broader portfolio that includes $4 billion from NASA for developing Starship, the next-generation megarocket; nearly $6 billion from the Space Force for launch services; and a reported $1.8 billion for Starshield, a classified spy satellite network. Were Dragon grounded, the United States would again be forced to rely on Russian Soyuz rockets for ISS access -- as it did between 2011 and 2020, following the Space Shuttle's retirement and before Crew Dragon entered service. "Under the current geopolitical climate, that would not be optimal," space analyst Laura Forczyk told AFP. NASA had hoped Boeing's Starliner would provide redundancy, but persistent delays -- and a failed crewed test last year -- have kept it grounded. Even Northrop Grumman's cargo missions now rely on SpaceX's Falcon 9, the workhorse of its rocket fleet. The situation also casts a shadow over NASA's Artemis program. A lunar lander variant of Starship is slated for Artemis III and IV, the next US crewed Moon missions. If Starship were sidelined, rival Blue Origin could benefit -- but the timeline would almost certainly slip, giving China, which aims to land humans by 2030, a chance to get there first, Forczyk warned. "There are very few launch vehicles as capable as Falcon 9 -- it isn't feasible to walk away as easily as President Trump might assume," she said. NASA meanwhile appeared eager to show that it had options. "NASA is assessing the earliest potential for a Starliner flight to the International Space Station in early 2026, pending system certification and resolution of Starliner's technical issues," the agency said in a statement Friday to AFP. Still, the feud could sour Trump on space altogether, Forczyk cautioned, complicating NASA's long-term plans. SpaceX isn't entirely dependent on the US government. Starlink subscriptions and commercial launches account for a significant share of its revenue, and the company also flies private missions. The next, with partner Axiom Space, will carry astronauts from India, Poland, and Hungary, funded by their respective governments. - Private power, public risk - But losing US government contracts would still be a major blow. "It's such a doomsday scenario for both parties that it's hard to envision how US space efforts would fill the gap," Clayton Swope, deputy director of the Aerospace Security Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told AFP. "Both sides have every reason to bridge the disagreement and get back to business." Signs of a rift emerged last weekend, when the White House abruptly withdrew its nomination of e-payments billionaire Jared Isaacman -- a close Musk ally who has twice flown to space with SpaceX -- as NASA administrator. On a recent podcast, Isaacman said he believed he was dropped because "some people had some axes to grind, and I was a good, visible target." The broader episode could also reignite debate over Washington's reliance on commercial partners, particularly when one company holds such a dominant position. Swope noted that while the US government has long favored buying services from industry, military leaders tend to prefer owning the systems they depend on. "This is just another data point that might bolster the case for why it can be risky," he said. "I think that seed has been planted in a lot of people's minds -- that it might not be worth the trust." ia/dw/nl/acb Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
