Blue Origin is ready to launch new Glenn Rocket after critical test

A towering new rocket built by Jeff Bezos' company Blue Origin successfully conducted a dress rehearsal of a launch countdown Friday evening, culminating with the seven engines of the booster stage igniting and firing for 24 seconds.

The vehicle remained firmly clamped to the launchpad at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. The test, known as a hot fire, was the last big technical hurdle. The next time the engines fire, the rocket, known as New Glenn, should be heading to space on its inaugural flight.

"Next stop launch," Bezos posted on the social platform X, sharing a video of the engines firing.

Neither Bezos nor his company announced a launch date. While Blue Origin officials had promised to launch this year, an advisory posted on an aviation industry website indicates it will miss that target by at least a few days into the new year, and could launch as early as Jan. 6.

Earlier in the day, the Federal Aviation Administration removed the final administrative hurdle to liftoff by issuing a launch license for New Glenn.

The rocket, which has been on the launchpad for weeks, will now head back to the hangar so that technicians can install the payload -- a prototype of a spacecraft called Blue Ring that Blue Origin is developing to move other spacecraft around in Earth orbit.

"Well, all we have left to do is mate our encapsulated payload...and then LAUNCH!" Dave Limp, CEO of Blue Origin, posted on X.

The first flight was to launch in October with two small Mars-bound orbiters for NASA, but the agency pulled them off when it became clear Blue Origin would not be ready in time.

Friday's hot fire test lasted for several hours, and it appeared that Blue Origin needed to attempt the countdown several times before the successful hot fire -- typical and expected hiccups for a new rocket on a new launchpad. The propellant tanks of the booster stage were filled with liquid methane and liquid oxygen, while the upper stage tanks were filled with liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen, exactly as they would be during a launch countdown.

Jarrett Jones, senior vice president for New Glenn at Blue Origin, said in a statement that the test was "a glimpse of what's just around the corner for New Glenn's first launch."

"Today's success proves that our rigorous approach to testing -- combined with our incredible tooling and design engineering -- is working as intended," he added.

New Glenn is named after John Glenn, the NASA astronaut who was the first American to circle the Earth in 1962. It is as tall as a 32-story building. It will compete with SpaceX's Falcon 9 rockets in launching commercial satellites, space probes for NASA and military spacecraft for the Defense Department.

The FAA license allows Blue Origin to launch New Glenn from Cape Canaveral and land its reusable booster stage on a barge in the Atlantic Ocean. The license is valid for five years.

Bezos founded Blue Origin in 2000, two years before Elon Musk started SpaceX. But so far its accomplishments are modest: a small rocket named New Glenn that has taken space tourists and experiments on short up-and-down flights.

In the coming years, Blue Origin has an ambitious slate of vehicles in development, including a private space station and a spacecraft for NASA to take astronauts to the surface of the moon.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.