Blue Origin stacks huge New Glenn rocket ahead of 1st launch (photo)

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Blue Origin showed off its New Glenn rocket after its two stages were mated in the company's Florida facility. The new rocket could take off on its maiden flight as soon as November.

a huge white rocket sits on its side in a hangar
The two stages of Blue Origin's huge New Glenn rocket in the company's facility near Kennedy Space Center in Florida. (Image credit: Blue Origin via X)

Blue Origin's massive new rocket is getting closer to being ready to fly.

The company shared a new photo of the two stages of its New Glenn rocket being joined together for the first time in the company's facility near NASA's Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida. "GS-1 meets GS-2," the company wrote on X (formerly Twitter) in a post accompanying the photo, in reference to the first (GS-1) and second (GS-2) stages of the new rocket.

New Glenn is expected to make its maiden flight sometime in November, taking off from Launch Complex 36 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, which is next door to KSC. The flight will carry one of the company's new Blue Ring spacecraft on a National Security Space Launch certification flight known as DarkSky-1 and sponsored by the Defense Innovation Unit. 

New Glenn features a reusable first-stage booster. The new rocket stands 270 feet (82 meters) tall in its two-stage version and 313 feet (95 m) tall in its three-stage version. SpaceX's Falcon 9, by comparison, stands between 209 feet (63.7 m) and 230 feet (70 m) tall, depending on its payload. 

Blue Ring is a spacecraft platform, meaning it can serve as a bus, or service module, for other spacecraft that can either be deployed into orbit or remain attached, as in the scheduled first flight. Blue Origin touts the vehicle's maneuverability, writing in a company statement that Blue Ring has unprecedented capabilities "to easily maneuver through multiple orbits."

Related: New Glenn: Blue Origin's reusable rocket

An illustration of Blue Origin's Blue Ring spacecraft platform in orbit above Earth.  (Image credit: Blue Origin)
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The Blue Ring platform is being marketed to both commercial and government customers and has data storage and data processing capabilities.

The next step in Blue Origin's testing and development of New Glenn will be a static hot fire test, in which the seven BE-4 engines on the rocket's first stage are ignited for several seconds. 

The rocket was scheduled to take off on its first mission in October 2024 to launch NASA's twin ESCAPADE Mars probes, but the space agency decided to stand down from that launch to avoid potential cost overruns related to the rocket's development.

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Brett Tingley
Brett Tingley
Managing Editor, Space.com

Brett is curious about emerging aerospace technologies, alternative launch concepts, military space developments and uncrewed aircraft systems. Brett's work has appeared on Scientific American, The War Zone, Popular Science, the History Channel, Science Discovery and more. Brett has English degrees from Clemson University and the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. In his free time, Brett enjoys skywatching throughout the dark skies of the Appalachian mountains.

5 Comments Comment from the forums
  • danR
    As hard as they have tried, New Glenn will still put less mass into LEO than SpaceX' old Falcon Heavy, with respect to full reusability.
    Reply
  • Ryan F. Mercer
    danR said:
    As hard as they have tried, New Glenn will still put less mass into LEO than SpaceX' old Falcon Heavy, with respect to full reusability.
    I don't believe the Falcon Heavy center stage or second stage are reusable in that configuration. The second stage isn't reusable in any configuration.
    Reply
  • Rob77
    Its always interesting to have a new player and see there unique designs.
    Wish Blue Origin a successful test launch.
    Reply
  • Philly
    Ryan F. Mercer said:
    I don't believe the Falcon Heavy center stage or second stage are reusable in that configuration. The second stage isn't reusable in any configuration.
    As of right now, Nov 14th 2024, no Blue Origin rocket has ever been declared even throw away "usable" for an orbital mission. In 25 years of existence the Space Company BO has placed exactly 0 Kg's into orbit. An epic failure by any measure. Especially considering how well funded they have been.

    I hate being this critical but, this is just a "cold shower" fact.

    I wish them luck BUT luck does't actually put anything into orbit. Everything for NG, is brand new. I don't even think they have tested trying to fuel the whole stack. Have they test fired the 1st stage, yet? The launch team, is also green any issues will be their 1st attempt at any kind of real trouble shooting a real problem. Most of their troubleshooting tools have never been used. H2 is always been a pesky fuel to tame.

    While I am glad they are pushing forward, rushing at this point also might seem kind of foolish. I am getting the feeling they are suffering from "Go Fever". I get the feeling they are still about 9-12 months away from the 1st test flight. I would think a few 2-3 hot test firings of the 1st stage would be in order. Another test firing of the 2nd stage would make sense. With extensive inspections after each test fire. Making sure nothing rattles apart is much easier to do on the ground.
    Reply
  • Goryar
    It is not a full stack, the rocket remains horizontal, but this is probably just a matter of moving it. If you look at it in perspective, it will be the launch of a definitive or finished rocket, not a prototype as will happen with the IFT5, with which Blue Origin enters a frank race. The only thing that has to happen is that everything has to go well, otherwise there will be a huge delay.
    Reply