Blue Origin gets its New Glenn rocket on track with new test fire

Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket hit a significant milestone this week, completing its first second-stage hot fire test that validates the interactions between the subsystems, its two BE-3U engines, and the ground control systems. The test lasted for 15 seconds and allowed the launch operations team to practice launch procedures in the lead-up to New Glenn’s planned November launch.

New Glenn is Blue Origin’s big rocket answer to SpaceX when it comes to shooting things into space, but Jeff Bezos’ company has been moving slowly and has only so far conducted tourist flights to suborbital space using its New Shepard rocket. New Glenn was supposed to launch the smallsat ESCAPADE in conjunction with NASA this year as its first mission, but it was recently canceled.

Now, New Glenn’s first mission (NG-1) will be to carry the company’s new Blue Ring orbital platform into space. Blue Origin plans to launch that mission from Cape Canaveral, Florida, this November.