Blue Origin rocket explodes during test, major setback in race with SpaceX

Jeff Bezos’ space venture suffered a dramatic launchpad explosion during a hot-fire test, delaying plans to compete with Elon Musk’s SpaceX in lunar and satellite missions.

An uncrewed Blue Origin New Glenn rocket erupted into a fireball during a test on Thursday, in a significant setback for Jeff Bezos’ space venture. Video posted online by NASASpaceflight showed the rocket igniting on the pad at around 21:00 ET (01:00 GMT Friday) before detonating, sending flames and smoke towering into the sky.

Blue Origin described the event as an “anomaly”, a standard term used in the space industry to indicate a test failure or explosion. “All personnel have been accounted for. We will provide updates as we learn more,” the company said in a post on X.

A hot-fire test involves firing a rocket’s engines while the vehicle remains anchored to the ground.

NASA monitors incident

NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said the agency was aware of the explosion.

“Spaceflight is unforgiving, and developing new heavy-lift launch capability is extraordinarily difficult. We will work with our partners to support a thorough investigation of this anomaly, assess near-term mission impacts, and get back to launching rockets,” he said on X.

NASA confirmed it would assess any impacts to Artemis lunar missions and Moon Base plans. Earlier this week, the agency awarded Blue Origin a $188 million contract to deliver rovers to the lunar surface using its uncrewed Mark 1 cargo lander.

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Bezos vows to rebuild

Jeff Bezos commented on X that it was “too early to know the root cause” of the explosion. “Very rough day, but we’ll rebuild whatever needs rebuilding and get back to flying. It’s worth it,” he said.

Space race with SpaceX heats up

Blue Origin and Elon Musk’s SpaceX are competing to support lunar missions and expand satellite networks. SpaceX, which is preparing for its IPO, has also experienced dramatic test failures, including last year’s Starship explosion in Texas.

Most recently, SpaceX partially succeeded in its 12th Starship test flight, deploying mock satellites but failing to land the Super Heavy booster. Musk reacted to Blue Origin’s test failure on X, stating: “Most unfortunate. Rockets are hard.”

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Ambitions for New Glenn

Blue Origin had been preparing the New Glenn rocket to launch 48 Amazon LEO satellites into low-Earth orbit, aiming to compete with SpaceX’s Starlink broadband network.

The company has spent roughly a decade and billions of dollars developing New Glenn, a 29-storey rocket with a reusable first stage intended to rival SpaceX’s Falcon fleet and Starship.

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration confirmed it was aware of the incident but said it fell outside its regulatory scope and posed no impact to air traffic in the region.

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