The American space company Blue Origin launched its large New Glenn rocket on Thursday for the first time, an inaugural flight that looks like a turning point for the company of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos which intends to catch up on its rival SpaceX. Elon Musk congratulated the latter on X for having “reached orbit on the first attempt”.
98 meters high, the size of a building of approximately 30 floors, New Glenn successfully took off around 2:03 a.m. local time from the Cape Canaveral space base in Florida, despite weather conditions that were not optimal.
Waited for years
The maiden flight of this powerful rocket had been anticipated for years and was postponed several times and even canceled at the last minute on Monday due to a technical problem. If the mission goes as planned, New Glenn is expected to reach orbit, which would be a first for the private space company founded in 2000.
“Anything beyond that is a bonus,” David Limp, CEO of Blue Origin, has already said. Although the company has already been taking tourists for a few minutes into space with its New Shepard rocket for several years, it has not yet carried out any orbital flights.
With New Glenn, much more powerful, it aims to enter a new market, that of launching commercial and military satellites into orbit but also ships and astronauts. And thus compete with SpaceX, which is owned by another American billionaire, Elon Musk, and which currently dominates the market with its Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets, and is currently developing the largest rocket ever created.
This megarocket named Starship must also carry out a seventh test flight on Thursday, weather permitting, after a postponement on Wednesday.
Partly reusable
For George Nield, president of a company promoting private space activities, the launch of New Glenn is good news for the entire space sector, because “it’s a good thing to have competition, to have choice.” “This is very important for the commercial space industry, but also for the government and NASA” because it not only reduces costs, but also offers a plan B “in the event of a problem with a device”, he explained before the flight.
-During this inaugural mission, which should last six hours, Blue Origin intends to attempt to recover the first stage of its rocket, which propelled the whole thing. Like SpaceX’s Falcon 9, the New Glenn rocket is partly reusable, a specificity which not only reduces costs but also allows for a higher flight rate.
Towards other flights in 2025?
Blue Origin has already managed to land its New Shepard rocket on land in Texas. But this time, it intends to try a controlled landing of the first stage on a barge at sea – a delicate maneuver similar to those carried out by SpaceX. It’s “ambitious,” admitted the CEO on X, “but we’re going to try it. Either way, we will learn a lot.”
The rocket will also carry a prototype of the Blue Ring multipurpose tug, a spacecraft intended to carry out operations in space and move satellites to their final orbits. Its technical functions will be tested during the mission, the company said. If this launch is a success, other New Glenn flights should follow in 2025.
Blue Origin has already signed contracts with several customers, including the US space agency for an unmanned mission to Mars, and the US government for national security missions. On the commercial side, it plans to deploy internet satellites for several companies. It should also, like SpaceX with Starlink, be responsible for launching satellites from the Amazon group. Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk, the two richest men in the world, are also fighting in the field of satellite internet.
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