Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket blasts into orbit for first time

AFP | Cape

Email : editor@newsofbahrain.com

Canaveral Blue Origin, the space company founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos, launched its massive New Glenn rocket into orbit for the first time early yesterday, a livestream of the blastoff showed.

The rocket, whose inaugural mission had been delayed by several years, blasted off at 2:03 am (0703 GMT) from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in the US state of Florida, the webcast showed.

The mission is seen as critical to Blue Origin’s efforts to compete with Elon Musk’s SpaceX, which dominates the commercial space industry.

“LIFTOFF! New Glenn is beginning its first ever ascent toward the stars,” Blue Origin said on social media platform X.

“New Glenn has passed the Karman line, the internationally recognized boundary of space!” the firm posted just a few minutes later.

And then: “Second stage engine cutoff confirmed. New Glenn’s second stage and payload are now in orbit.” Blue Origin executive Ariane Cornell, speaking during the launch livestream, said the mission had achieved its “main objective” of reaching orbit.

But she also confirmed “that we did, in fact, lose the booster,” which they were trying to land on a drone ship stationed about 620 miles (1,000 kilometers) downrange in the Atlantic Ocean.

Rival SpaceX has made such landings now routine, but this would have been Blue Origin’s first shot at the feat.

Blue Origin has experience landing its New Shepard rockets -- used for suborbital tourism -- but they are five times smaller and land on terra firma rather than a ship at sea.