WASHINGTON — Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket achieved orbit on its long-awaited first launch Jan. 16, although the company failed in its attempt to recover the first stage.
New Glenn lifted off at 2:03 a.m. Eastern from Launch Complex 36 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. The massive rocket, powered by seven BE-4 engines in its first stage, slowly ascended.
Stage separation took place a little more than three minutes after liftoff. The upper stage ignited its two BE-3U engines and continued its ascent to orbit while the first stage headed towards a landing on Jacklyn, a Blue Origin ship that serves as a landing platform in the Atlantic Ocean.
The second stage shut down as planned nearly 13 minutes after liftoff, having achieved orbital velocity. Blue Origin emphasized that achieving orbit was the primary objective for this mission, designated NG-1.
The first stage fired three BE-4 engines for a reentry burn, but telemetry on the launch webcast showing the stage’s speed and altitude froze during its descent. After the second stage achieved orbit, the company confirmed that the booster was lost, but didn’t provide additional details.
Liftoff after many delays
Blue Origin made a first attempt to launch New Glenn early Jan. 13. However, it called off the launch a little more than two hours into the three-hour window, stating at the time that “a vehicle subsystem issue” could not be fixed before the launch window closed. The company later stated that ice formed in a purge line associated with an auxiliary power unit that powers some of the rocket’s hydraulics.
It briefly considered making another launch attempt Jan. 14 but canceled those plans within a couple hours. The range was not available Jan. 15 because of a previously scheduled launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 carrying two commercial lunar landers.
Blue Origin had been working towards a launch as soon as early January after completing a static-fire test of the rocket’s first stage Dec. 27 at the end of a fueling test and countdown rehearsal. The company received a Federal Aviation Administration launch license the same day as that static-fire test.
New Glenn is an orbital rocket under development by the company for more than a decade. In September 2015, the company formally announced plans to develop the rocket, which later was named New Glenn, using Launch Complex 36 and with a new factory built just outside the gates of nearby Kennedy Space Center.
The company once targeted a first launch of New Glenn in 2020, but the schedule for the launch repeatedly slipped. That led to a NASA decision in September 2024 to take a Mars smallsat mission called ESCAPADE off the inaugural launch as the agency concluded the vehicle would not be ready before the launch window for ESCAPADE closed in mid-October.
The payload for NG-1 is what the company calls Blue Ring Pathfinder, which will remain attached to the upper stage. It includes tests of communications equipment that will be used on Blue Ring, the orbital transfer vehicle being developed by Blue Origin.
“Data from the mission will support future production, launch vehicle integration, and on-orbit operations of the Blue Ring space vehicle,” Blue Origin said in a mission overview document. Once the upper stage is in its planned elliptical medium Earth orbit, mission is scheduled to last less than six hours, according to the company’s NG-1 timeline.
Recovery attempt
Company officials had emphasized the importance of recovering the first stage. “For this first launch, I have two primary objectives: get to orbit and land the booster,” Jarrett Jones, senior vice president for New Glenn at Blue Origin, said at a conference in September, emphasizing it was “super-critical” to demonstrate recovery and reusability so that the company could ramp up its launch rate quickly to as many as 24 flights a year in 2026.
“Our objective is to reach orbit,” Dave Limp, chief executive of Blue Origin, said in a Jan. 9 social media post. “Anything beyond that is a bonus. Landing our booster offshore is ambitious—but we’re going for it. No matter what, we will learn a lot.”
That was summarized in the name that Blue Origin assigned to the New Glenn first stage: “So You’re Telling Me There’s a Chance.”