Blue Origin took another significant step toward the launch of its large New Glenn rocket on Tuesday night by rolling the first stage of the vehicle to a launch site at Cape Canaveral, Florida.
Although the company's rocket factory in Florida is only a few miles from Launch Complex 36 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, because of the rocket and transporter's size, the procession had to follow a more circuitous route. In a post on LinkedIn, Blue Origin's chief executive, Dave Limp, said the route taken by the rocket to the pad is 23 miles long.
Limp also provided some details on GERT, the company's nickname for the "Giant Enormous Rocket Truck" devised to transport the massive New Glenn first stage.
Welcome to Edition 7.17 of the Rocket Report! Next week marks 10 years since one of the more spectacular launch failures of this century. On October 28, 2014, an Antares rocket, then operated by Orbital Sciences, suffered an engine failure six seconds after liftoff from Virginia and crashed back onto the pad in a fiery twilight explosion. I was there and won't forget seeing the rocket falter just above the pad, being shaken by the deafening blast, and then running for cover. The Antares rocket is often an afterthought in the space industry, but it has an interesting backstory touching on international geopolitics, space history, and novel engineering. Now, Northrop Grumman and Firefly Aerospace are developing a new version of Antares.
As always, we welcome reader submissions. If you don't want to miss an issue, please subscribe using the box below (the form will not appear on AMP-enabled versions of the site). Each report will include information on small-, medium-, and heavy-lift rockets as well as a quick look ahead at the next three launches on the calendar.
Astra gets a lifeline from DOD. Astra, the launch startup that was taken private again earlier this year for a sliver of its former value, has landed a new contract with the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU) to support the development of a next-gen launch system for time-sensitive space missions, TechCrunch reports. The contract, which the DIU awarded under its Novel Responsive Space Delivery (NRSD) program, has a maximum value of $44 million. The money will go toward the continued development of Astra’s Launch System 2, designed to perform rapid, ultra-low-cost launches.
Enlarge/ Blue Origin test fires the second stage of its New Glenn rocket. (credit: Blue Origin)
Twenty days after it rolled out to Blue Origin's launch site in Florida, the second stage of the massive New Glenn rocket underwent a successful hot-fire test on Monday.
The second stage—known as GS2 for Glenn stage 2—ignited for 15 seconds as part of the "risk reduction" hot-fire test, the company said. The two BE-3U engines, fueled by liquid oxygen and hydrogen and each producing 173,000 pounds of thrust, burned with a nearly transparent flame that approached a temperature of 6,000° Fahrenheit.
This marked the first time that Blue Origin, a space company founded by Jeff Bezos more than two decades ago, has integrated and fired an orbital rocket stage. After the test, Blue Origin said it is still tracking toward a November launch of the New Glenn rocket.
Enlarge/ Landspace's reusable rocket test vehicle lifts off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center on Wednesday, September 11, 2024. (credit: Landspace)
Welcome to Edition 7.11 of the Rocket Report! Outside of companies owned by American billionaires, the most imminent advancements in reusable rockets are coming from China's quasi-commercial launch industry. This industry is no longer nascent. After initially relying on solid-fueled rocket motors apparently derived from Chinese military missiles, China's privately funded launch firms are testing larger launchers, with varying degrees of success, and now performing hop tests reminiscent of SpaceX's Grasshopper and F9R Dev1 programs more than a decade ago.
As always, we welcome reader submissions. If you don't want to miss an issue, please subscribe using the box below (the form will not appear on AMP-enabled versions of the site). Each report will include information on small-, medium-, and heavy-lift rockets as well as a quick look ahead at the next three launches on the calendar.
Landspace hops closer to a reusable rocket. Chinese private space startup Landspace has completed a 10-kilometer (33,000-foot) vertical takeoff and vertical landing test on its Zhuque-3 (ZQ-3) reusable rocket testbed, including a mid-flight engine reignition at near supersonic conditions, Aviation Week & Space Technology reports. The 18.3-meter (60-foot) vehicle took off from the Jiuquan launch base in northwestern China, ascended to 10,002 meters, and then made a vertical descent and achieved an on-target propulsive landing 3.2 kilometers (2 miles) from the launch pad. Notably, the rocket's methane-fueled variable-thrust engine intentionally shutdown in flight, then reignited for descent, as engines would operate on future full-scale booster flybacks. The test booster used grid fins and cold gas thrusters to control itself when its main engine was dormant, according to Landspace.
Enlarge/ Image of the New Glenn second stage on its mobile test stand. (credit: Blue Origin)
Blue Origin plans to enter the final phase of its launch preparations for the New Glenn rocket on Monday by rolling the vehicle's second stage to Launch Complex 36 in Florida. Pending weather and other final considerations, a rollout could occur as early as Monday afternoon.
This is the flight version of the vehicle, with the exception of a fixed adaptor for weather protection during a test campaign. The launch company is targeting a hot fire test of the upper stage, which is powered by two BE-3U engines, within the next week or so.
The launch company, founded by Amazon's Jeff Bezos, is closing in on the debut launch of the massive New Glenn rocket, which will be one of the most powerful launch vehicles in the world. With a fully reusable first stage, New Glenn has a lift capacity of 45 metric tons to low-Earth orbit.
Enlarge/ The two spacecraft for NASA's ESCAPADE mission at Rocket Lab's factory in Long Beach, California. (credit: Rocket Lab)
Two NASA spacecraft built by Rocket Lab are on the road from California to Florida this weekend to begin preparations for launch on Blue Origin's first New Glenn rocket.
These two science probes must launch between late September and mid-October to take advantage of a planetary alignment between Earth and Mars that only happens once every 26 months. NASA tapped Blue Origin, Jeff Bezos' space company, to launch the Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorers (ESCAPADE) mission with a $20 million contract.
Last November, the space agency confirmed the $79 million ESCAPADE mission will launch on the inaugural flight of Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket. With this piece of information, the opaque schedule for Blue Origin's long-delayed first New Glenn mission suddenly became more clear.
Enlarge/ Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket on the launch pad for testing earlier this year. (credit: Blue Origin)
After years of lobbying, protests, and bidding, Jeff Bezos's space company is now a military launch contractor.
The US Space Force announced Thursday that Blue Origin will compete with United Launch Alliance and SpaceX for at least 30 military launch contracts over the next five years. These launch contracts have a combined value of up to $5.6 billion.
This is the first of two major contract decisions the Space Force will make this year as the military seeks to foster more competition among its roster of launch providers and reduce its reliance on just one or two companies.
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