SPACE LAUNCH REPORT Blue Origin New Glenn Flight History by Variant/Year (20xx-Present) by Ed Kyle, Last Update February 22, 2024 L(F) = Number of Launches(Number of Failures) New Glenn Year L(F) L(F) L(F) L(F) L(F) L(F) L(F) ------------------------------------------------------------------ 2020 - - - - - - 2021 - - - - - - 2022 - - - - - - 2023 - - - - - 2024 ------------------------------------------------------------------ New Glenn Year L(F) L(F) L(F) L(F) L(F) L(F) L(F) ------------------------------------------------------------------ Total 0(0) ------------------------------------------------------------------ Footnotes: Vehicle Configurations (Estimated) ------------------------------------------------------------------ LEO GTO GEO Trans- Height GLOW (tonnes) (tonnes) (tonnes) Mars (meters) (t) 200 km 185 x (tonnes) x51.6 deg 35,786 km x 27 deg ================================================================== New Glenn 45 t 13.6 t >6.577 t ~3t 96 m ~1,390 t 2-Stg New Glenn 3-Stg (Deferred) ================================================================== Estimates assume first stage downrange recovery. New Glenn(2-Stg) 7xBE-4 Stg 1 + 2xBE-3U Stg 2 + 7m PLF Vehicle Components ------------------------------------------------------------------ Stage 1 Stage 2 PLF Recoverable (BE-3U) ================================================================== Diameter (m) 7 m 7 m 7m Length (m) 57.5 m 23.4 m 21.9 m incl I/S incl eng (16.1 m tanks) Mb/o (tonnes) ~110 t ~12 t GLOW (tonnes) ~1,110t ~120 t ~4 t Engine BE-4 BE-3U Engine Mfgr Blue Origin Blue Origin ORSC OEC Fuel LNG LH2 Oxidizer LOX LOX T(SL t) 1,746 t - T(Vac t) 2,041 t 108.9 t ISP(SL s) ~310 s ISP(Vac s) ~335 s ~440 s Tburn (s) 199 s 717 s No. Engines 7 2 ================================================================== Comments Stage 1 uses downrange floating platform landing New Glenn Launch History Date Vehicle No. Payload Mass Site Orbit ----------------------------------------------------------------- NN/NN/NN NGL NN NNNNN NNN NN NN NNN ----------------------------------------------------------------- ----------------------------------------------------------------- SPACE LAUNCH REPORT NEW GLENN HISTORY Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon.com, started Blue Origin in 2000. The company became publically known six years later when it purchased land for a test site in west Texas. During the next few years, as the secretive company developed a series of liquid rocket engines, Blue Origin's work on its BE-3 powered New Shepard suborbital tourist-carrying vehicle gradually became public as the effort progressed to its first successful flight in 2015. Meanwhile, Blue Origin's engineers were studying designs for an orbital launch vehicle, an effort that began before 2012. Their studies led to the decision to develop BE-4, a powerful, throttleable staged-combustion LNG/LOX engine. On September 15, 2015, Blue Origin announced that it would launch its new orbital rocket, at the time known as "Very Big Brother", from a rebuilt Space Launch Complex 36 at Cape Canaveral. The company also announced that it would build a production facility at Exploration Park on nearby Merritt Island, creating over 300 jobs. Construction began at the Exploration Park factory site during 2016. Blue Origin revealed that its new rocket would be powered by BE-4 engines, but did not say how many engines would be used. On September 12, 2016, Blue Origin revealed more details for its launch vehicle, including its name. The rocket, named "New Glenn", was named in honor of John Glenn, the first U.S. orbital astronaut. New Glenn would be massive. A two-stage version would stand 82 meters tall and would be able to lift 45 tonnes to low Earth orbit or 13 tonnes to geostationary transfer orbit. The first stage would be powered by seven BE-4 engines that together would produce 1,746 tonnes of sea-level thrust. A single vacuum-optimized BE-4U engine, capable of 290 tonnes of thrust in vacuum, would power the second stage. Both stages would burn LNG/LOX. The two-stage New Glenn, which could lift 45 tonnes to LEO or 13 tonnes to GTO, might be ready to fly in 2020. It would fly from a new pad built at the former site of Cape Canaveral's SLC 36, which once hosted Atlas-Centaur. The site would be augmented by the construction of an engine test facility at adjacent LC 11, a long-retired Atlas launch site. A three-stage New Glenn variant could fly several years after the two-stage version. The high-energy third stage would be powered by a single LH2/LOX BE-3U engine, providing substantial payload capability for deep space missions. The three-stage variant would stand nearly 95 meters tall. On March 7, 2017, Blue Origin revealed more information about its plans for its New Glenn rocket. The first stage was shown for the first time with a pair of strakes near its base, along with four rotating fins on its interstage, for reentry and post-reentry maneuvering. Its center engine would restart and throttle during a landing on a sea-going vessel waiting down range. Six landing legs would extend from the base of the stage just prior to landing. Around the same time, Blue Origin also announced that it had won contracts to launch a satellite for Eutelsat in 2021 or 2022 and to launch five OneWeb satellites that would be built across the street from the New Glenn factory on Merritt Island. Design Changes On September 12, 2017, Blue Origin announced that it had decided to skip development of the 5.4 meter diameter payload fairing originally shown in illustrations in favor of "going straight to the 7m fairing". The company said that the bigger fairing would provide twice as much internal volume as the smaller fairing. On March 29, 2018, SpaceNews reported that Blue Origin had changed its plans for New Glenn's second stage. The company had abandoned plans to develop BE-4U in favor of using a pair of BE-3U LOX/LH2 engines to power the stage. Liquid hydrogen fuel in place of LNG would require a stretched second stage, but the total propellant load would still be substantially less than the original plan because of the lower fuel density of LH2. The resulting two-stage rocket would be able to meet the U.S. Air Force EELV mission requirements (6.577 tonnes to geosyncronous orbit, 17.01 tonnes to low earth polar orbit, etc.) while eliminating an entire engine development effort. Blue Origin believed that the new plan would allow it to begin flying New Glenn before the end of 2020. Although Blue Origin had changed New Glenn's design, the company's web site contined to show the original plan as of early April, 2018. A guess about the new second stage design can be made based on the fact that two BE-3U engines together should produce about 120 tonnes of thrust in vacuum. Thanks to thrust to weight limitations, the stage would very likely end up weighing about 120 tonnes, give or take 10 to 20 tonnes. This would make it roughly the same weight and size of the S-IVB stage used by NASA's Saturn IB and Saturn 5 rockets. First BE-4 Rolls Out at Blue Origin during March, 2017 Blue Origin rolled out its first complete BE-4 engine during March, 2017 before shipping the engine to its West Texas where full-scale testing was expected to begin within a few weeks. During May, 2017, Blue Origin suffered a BE-4 "power pack" failure at the company's West Texas test site. The failure appeared to set back development efforts for several months since the expected full-scale BE-4 engine test did not take place "within a few weeks" after its delivery as originally announced. On October 18, 2017, after months of delay following a May 2017 power pack test failure, Blue Origin performed an initial successful hot fire test of its full-scale BE-4 engine. The engine was fired at 50% thrust for about three seconds at the company's West Texas test facility. Testing at higher thrust levels and for longer durations were reported during early 2018. New Glenn October 2018 User's Guide During October, 2018, Blue Origin released an updated Payload User's Guide that provided new details about the modified New Glenn design. The three-stage variant was deferred because the two-stage design using a liquid hydrogen fueled BE-3U powered second stage would be able to meet the existing goals. Performance was listed as 45 tonnes to a 200 km x 51.6 deg low Earth orbit or 13.6 tonnes to a 185 x 35,186 km x 27 deg geosynchronous transfer orbit. Two-stage New Glenn height grew to 96 meters (313 feet) including the 21.9 meter tall payload fairing. Plans for a dual payload adapters were listed that would ultimately allow two large satellites to be carried to GTO at a time. During a typical GTO mission the first stage would fire for 199 seconds before separating, reentering, and restarting some of its BE-4 engines to land on a ship downrange. The second stage would perform an initial 618 second burn to reach a 157 x 705 km x 28 deg parking orbit. It would restart after an 878 sec coast to perform a second burn that would last for 99 seconds to insert the stage and payload into GTO. ULA/SpaceX Win NSSL On August 7, 2020, the U.S. Space Force awarded National Security Space Launch Phase 2 contracts to United Launch Alliance and SpaceX, locking out bidders Blue Origin (New Glenn) and Northrop Grumman (Omega) as primary contractors, though both would serve as subcontractors for ULA's winning Vulcan launch vehicle. Blue Origin announced that it intended to continue development of its New Glenn launch vehicle, aiming to win civil and commercial space contracts. Its new launch site at Cape Canaveral was within a few months of completion, with plans for a facilities test vehicle to be rolled out to the new pad likely within a year. Northrop Grumman only said that it was disappointed in the announcement. Omega's first and second stage motors had already been test fired, its mobile launch platform was under construction, and its liquid hydrogen upper stage was to have been test fired in a few months. The announcement set the stage for US space launch during the next decade, since Pentagon money is a substantial engine for the business. Prototype Roll Out The New Glenn prototype first stage, intended for propellant loading testing at SLC 36, rolled out on January 10, 2024 and was erected on the pad with a second stage and fairing on February 21, 2024. At the time of the rollout, Blue Origin announced that the first stage would eventually fly. It would be fitted with engines for a hot-fire test at the pad and would fly afterward. The company said that it was building the first four New Glenn first stages and that the seven BE-4 engines for the first hot-fire test were in qualification testing. The company planned a four-booster fleet at first. First stage landing attempts would begin on the first flight. Twelve launches per year were planned. Blue Origin said that it had completed three New Glenn second stages and that it had three more in production. It was studying methods for future second stage and fairing recovery. The first launch was expected during 2024. References Blue Origin New Glenn Press Information, 2015-24 "Blue Origin switches engines for New Glenn second stage", Caleb Henry, SpaceNews, March 29, 2018 New Glenn Payload Users Guide, Revision C, October 2018