Blue Origin, the aerospace company founded by Jeff Bezos, has taken a significant step toward the inaugural launch of its colossal New Glenn rocket. The rocket was positioned vertically on the launch pad at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station’s Launch Complex 36 on Thursday, marking a major milestone ahead of an upcoming hot-fire test. The maiden flight is targeting liftoff by the end of the year.
Credit: Blue Origin
The company shared the progress on social media, stating, “Up we go! The steel launch table that New Glenn sits on weighs 1.7 million pounds (approximately 726 metric tons), including the clamps that connect to the vehicle’s aft ring.” The integrated first and second stages of the rocket were assembled earlier this month and transported to the pad overnight on Wednesday.
Dave Limp, Blue Origin’s CEO, highlighted the complexity of the operation on X, formerly known as Twitter: “Another step towards launch. The transport and lift operation relies on our Transporter Erector or TE, a structure that’s almost 300 feet long, 50 feet wide, and weighs more than 4 million pounds.”
When fully assembled, New Glenn will stand 322 feet tall, making it one of the largest rockets in the world. Powered by seven BE-4 engines, the reusable first-stage booster generates up to 3.9 million pounds of thrust at liftoff and is designed for up to 25 reflights.
The first flight of New Glenn will test Blue Origin’s innovative Blue Ring hardware, a system designed to deliver payloads to precise orbital locations. This flight also serves as one of two required missions for Space Force certification, enabling the rocket to carry national security payloads in the future.
Blue Origin plans to recover the first-stage booster by landing it on a recovery vessel in the Atlantic Ocean, following a similar approach to SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket landings.
The company has been developing New Glenn and its launch infrastructure for several years. The rocket is manufactured at Blue Origin’s facility in Merritt Island, adjacent to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex, and transported to the historic LC-36 launch site. The pad, leased by Blue Origin since 2015, has undergone a $1 billion overhaul after serving as a hub for government launches from 1962 to 2005, including the Surveyor 1 lunar lander mission.
In addition to the New Glenn milestone, Blue Origin’s suborbital rocket, New Shepard, successfully launched on Friday, carrying six passengers, including the 100th woman to travel to space.
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