Blue Origin Places New Glen Rocket On Launch Pad Ror The First Time

Blue Origin, a space company owned by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, shared a new photo showing a rocket on the launch pad of Launch Complex 36 (LC-36) at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

On Wednesday, the fully assembled rocket was rolled out of the hangar. New Glenn stands 300 feet tall and is one of the largest rockets ever to come to Florida. It can carry about 45 tons of payload into low-Earth orbit – more than United Launch Alliance’s (ULA) Vulcan or SpaceX’s Falcon 9, but less than Falcon Heavy. Blue Origin plans to use New Glenn to launch spacecraft to the Moon as part of NASA’s Artemis program. Its fairing is large enough to accommodate three school buses, the developer boasted, and the reusable first stage is designed for at least 25 missions with landing on a water platform at a distance of up to 1000 km along the flight path.

The existing New Glenn does not yet have engines. For now, the task is to check the functionality of the launch pad and ground systems. In the coming months, Blue Origin plans to complete testing of seven methane-fuelled BE-4 engines and two hydrogen-fueled BE-3U upper stage engines. If all goes according to plan, the company will complete a comprehensive refueling test within a few weeks. After that, the rocket will be removed from the launch pad to allow technicians to install the engine bay with seven BE-4s – fire tests of seven engines are planned for the summer.

The New Glenn rocket is named after John Glenn, who in 1962 became the first American to reach Earth’s orbit.

Reacting to the rocket hitting the launch pad for the first time, Bezos tweeted: “Great year ahead. Go!”