FAA clears New Glenn for launch
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) yesterday approved the results of Blue Origin’s investigation into the failure of the upper stage of the company’s New Glenn rocket to reach orbit on the rocket’s third launch in April 2026.
The Blue Origin tweet announcing this FAA decision provided little information, saying only this:
The FAA has approved our NG-3 report, and corrective measures have been implemented. Prior to our second GS2 [upper stage] burn, we experienced an off-nominal thermal condition, and, as a result, one of the BE-3U engines didn’t achieve full thrust to reach our target orbit.
Blue Origin says it is preparing for the next New Glenn launch, but provided no information about when. The company is under heavy pressure to up its launch rate, which compared to SpaceX, Rocket Lab, and ULA appears almost pitiful in its slowness. It had had a contract with Amazon to do 27 Leo satellite launches, but that total has been reduced to 24 due to the lack of launches. It is also unable to do any military launches until it flies New Glenn successfully four more times.
Getting New Glenn off the ground successfully and quickly is becoming critical for the company.
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I recall Dave Limp saying last year they wanted to hit double-digit launches for 2026, and that they’re completing one New Glenn every month, but I’m skeptical they’ll make it this year. Perhaps next, that would still be good long term, if not so good for their contractual obligations.
An “off-nominal thermal condition” sounds like a euphemism for some sort of energetic “observation” such as an engine bay fire or explosion. Whatever it was, there will either be a quick and easy fix for it or there won’t.
The pressure Blue is under is not just to launch again with reasonable dispatch but to also do so successfully. Hurrying will avail Blue naught if it stubs its toe again in the process.
I wish Blue well, but I also have decidedly limited expectations of it for what remains of the current year. If we don’t see at least two more successful no-asterisk New Glenn launch missions by year’s end – one of which needs to be a successful test of the Blue Moon Mk-1 lunar lander – then I think Blue will be a no-show for Artemis 3.
It took me half-a-second to place New Glenn as an active rocket.
Robert wrote: “The company is under heavy pressure to up its launch rate, which compared to SpaceX, Rocket Lab, and ULA appears almost pitiful in its slowness.”
To be fair, Blue Origin is new to orbital launches, and the other three companies have vehicles that have been launching for years.
However, Blue does need to get their launch cadence up in order to compete. As Robert noted, they are already losing business that they should not have lost. I do not see this as a problem, yet, because new rockets have bugs that need to be exterminated. Sometimes those bugs cause mission failures, and that is when organizations such as the FAA or NTSB get involved.
Yeah, building up cadence takes time.
If I remember correctly: FH-> 4+ years for 4 flights; Vulcan, F9 -> both 2++ years.
So New Glenn will probably beat these three.
Interestingly Ariane 6 is really great in this metric. Less than 1.5 years for 4 flights (faster than Electron).
So, maybe our mantra is misleading us a bit: New-space has always to be faster than Old-space (in every metric), and Blue has always to be slower than SpaceX.
Well put Agenor
Ideology blinds people…
Agenor,
Your argument would be stronger (and frankly, it’s a strawman–what matters to customers is how quickly they can get their payloads to orbit, which is why Blue Origin is under pressure, not who got to a cherry-picked number of launches faster than whom) if Blue was ramping up New Glenn’s cadence at around the same time as those other examples (FYI, Heavy did three launches in sixteen months, so SpaceX was clearly capable of launching it at a faster pace if need be). Instead, Blue is facing a mature Falcon 9/Heavy and Electron, soon Starship, and multiple other competitors developing new rockets. Amazon didn’t reduce their options to buy New Glenn launches and buy more F9 flights just because of ideology.
Jeff Wright,
Do us all a favor and examine your ideology, would you?
Blue Origin is targeting NET June 2nd for NG-4.
My ideology is what works.
Jeff Wright,
That isn’t an ideology, and it also isn’t true. Can you come up with a definition of ‘works’ that, say, our host Robert, or Dick Eagleson, or Edward, would agree with?