Blue Origin Is Eating SpaceX's Lunch
But we shouldn't cheer for them.
The first Space Race was an intercontinental ideological battle that eventually culminated in one of the most complex acts of cross-border cooperation: the ISS. By comparison, the new ‘space race’ is just a billionaire dick-measuring contest, and, like most men who peaked twenty years ago, some are struggling to even get it up (i.e., Starship). Now, Blue Origin is beginning to overtake SpaceX, much like the tortoise to the hare. However, unlike Starship, their New Glenn rocket (which is Starship’s direct competitor) is actually walking the walk. Last Sunday, Blue Origin launched its New Glenn rocket for the third time, and while it experienced some rather major hiccups, it once again proved that it is miles ahead of Starship. But should we celebrate Musk taking an L here?
NG-3
Let’s start with this launch, which was called NG-3, because despite it being called a test launch, it wasn’t really a ‘test launch’. NG-3 carried a paying customer’s payload, a gigantic AST SpaceMobile cellular internet satellite called BlueBird 7, which New Glenn was tasked with taking to Low Earth Orbit (LEO).
However, NG-3 did have other objectives; namely, this was the first time they reflew a booster. From a conceptual standpoint, New Glenn is essentially a larger, more powerful and more efficient version of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 because it is partially reusable, with the upper stage/fairing being a consumable part and the booster using retro-rockets to safely return to Earth for future use. Blue Origin failed to land the booster from the first launch but successfully landed it on the second. NG-3 used that landed booster, making it the first time a New Glenn booster had been reflown. Proving reusability was a key target for this mission, which is exactly what they did.
For the most part, NG-3 went well. It left the launch pad, the stages separated successfully, the booster flew back and landed safely, the upper stage reached orbit, and the payload was successfully delivered to orbit. It was a nearly perfect mission, except for one giant caveat.
The payload was delivered to the wrong orbit!
As TechCrunch reported, just two hours after launch, Blue Origin announced that it had placed the $30 million, 6.1-metric-ton, 233-square-metre satellite in an “off-nominal orbit”. Then, AST SpaceMobile released a statement that New Glenn had placed the BlueBird 7 satellite into an orbit that was “lower than planned”, that this orbit was too low “to sustain operations”, and that the giant BlueBird 7 satellite would need to be deorbited as soon as possible.
That is… less than ideal and does mean that Blue Origin failed its primary mission.
Since then, the FAA has grounded New Glenn and launched an investigation. That might sound alarming, but it’s just standard procedure. Plus, Blue Origin has already admitted to its mistakes. Blue Origin’s chief executive, Dave Limp, claimed that this error occurred because of a lack of “sufficient thrust” in a single engine — which is, most likely, a fixable issue, given that these engines have worked well enough before.
In Context
Delivering a satellite to the wrong orbit might sound like a biggie, and I’m sure it is to AST SpaceMobile, but in the grand scheme of things, NG-3 was still a sizeable leap forward for Blue Origin.
Let’s not forget that this is just its third launch. New Glenn’s first launch, NG-1, was partially successful, as it placed a dummy satellite in Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) but failed to land its booster. Its second launch, NG-2, was a complete success, launching two NASA missions to Mars and safely landing the booster (read more here). So, the fact that NG-3 was only a partial success is still a significant step in the right direction, as they have demonstrated their booster can be relaunched.
Let’s also not forget the name of New Glenn’s biggest competitor. New Glenn is a reusable heavy-lift vehicle designed to lower the cost of launching satellite constellations and crewed missions to the lunar surface. It has exactly the same mission brief as Starship; it just goes about its role in a very different way.
