Bezos might beat Musk to Mars as NASA recruits Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket

Blue Origin is expected to launch two small Martian satellites as the first-ever interplanetary payload aboard its upcoming New Glenn rocket, NASA confirmed this week. In February, the Jeff Bezos-owned aerospace biz was awarded the Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorers (ESCAPADE) contract under the space agency …

[Wellyboot]

Nothing much to be missed if lost.

Historically the first flight of any new rocket type is almost a guaranteed fail, but if the satellites are cheap enough and their loss won't impact any other program why not take the risk to bump this up the schedule, New Glenn may beat the odds.

Worst case, building another pair will keep some engineers gainfully employed for a while.

[Santa from Exeter]

Re: Nothing much to be missed if lost.

New Glenn *may* beat the odds, when it eventually flies. I wouldn't hold out too many hopes of 2024, never mind August.

[balrog]

Re: Nothing much to be missed if lost.

Oh its way more likely to be an August than 2024.......

[John Brown (no body)]

Re: Nothing much to be missed if lost.

The article mentions test flights before that launch, which seem to imply that the Mars sat launch won't be it's first launch, just its first active delivery mission.

[FrogsAndChips]

Re: Nothing much to be missed if lost.

The way I understand it, this may not be the very first flight, but still a practice test, hence the high-risk qualification by NASA. There's no way the New Glenn rocket will have performed enough test flights by August to take on the ESCAPADE satellites as a full commercial payload.

[MachDiamond]

Re: Nothing much to be missed if lost.

"there's no way the New Glenn rocket will have performed enough test flights by August to take on the ESCAPADE satellites as a full commercial payload."

It's hard to say with BO. They don't need to keep outside investors happy or attract venture capital so they don't say a whole lot about where they are with projects. You only know where they are when they do something publicly.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Nothing much to be missed if lost.

"Historically the first flight of any new rocket type is almost a guaranteed fail"

Not always. The first 18 Falcon 9 launches made it to orbit before the one and only complete launch failure the F9 has had.

The 4th launch is classed as only a partial success. A secondary payload satellite that was riding along with a Dragon resupply mission didn't make it into the correct orbit. That was due to NASA (the primary customer for the mission) not letting them relight an engine that had shut down during the launch. Primary customers get a veto on re-ignition. The rocket still made it into orbit and got the Dragon capsule to the ISS.

[Flocke Kroes]

Possible cunning plan

If (when?) New Glenn misses the deadline the next launch window will not be for a couple more years. It is remotely possible New Glenn will fly other payloads before 2026 and by the time ESCAPADE is ready again New Glenn will be a low risk rocket. NASA will be getting a $70M launch for $20M + two years storage costs.

[Lon24]

Back to square 1. Do not pass Go. Do not collect ...

"Engineers overhauled the rocket's initial design, changing its boosters and engines,"

Errm, isn't that basically the rocket?

[John Brown (no body)]

Re: Back to square 1. Do not pass Go. Do not collect ...

Depends how you calculate it :-)

The core stage and tankage etc is all still there, but possibly modified for the new engines, so yeah, a bit like an old car or plane restoration that only has maybe 10-15% original, everything else is new :-)

[Strahd Ivarius]

Re: Back to square 1. Do not pass Go. Do not collect ...

A kind of Ship of Theseus then?

[John Brown (no body)]

Re: Back to square 1. Do not pass Go. Do not collect ...

I'd have said Triggers Broom, but clearly you are more edjumated than what I am :-)

[Dave 126]

Re: Back to square 1. Do not pass Go. Do not collect ...

Trigger's Broom is likely more often understood than Ship of Theuses is by the average bloke on the street - if that street is in Britain. I wonder, is there an equivalent idiom from USA popular culture?

[jmch]

Re: Back to square 1. Do not pass Go. Do not collect ...

Not sure if it's US or British origin, but there is 'my grandfather's ax(e)'

[el_oscuro]

Re: Back to square 1. Do not pass Go. Do not collect ...

That assumes that Blue Origin actually has a rocket. Something that I have seen no evidence of.

[gecho]

If all goes according to plan the Blue Origin engines will get their first flight test Christmas Eve on ULA's Vulcan rocket.

[steelpillow]

The cow [used to] jump over the moon

With both SpaceX and Blue Origin now being given serious NASA pie, the likes of the old stalwarts' super-expensive and super-unreliable SLS and Starliner must be quaking in their moonboots now. The cash cow has kinda stopped jumping over the moon.

[RegGuy1]

Re: The cow [used to] jump over the moon

The job of SLS has only been to keep funding jobs in the space industry. After the shuttle was shut down if they didn't have SLS all those skills would be lost. And there's lots of votes right across the US to be won, so pumping stupid amounts of money into SLS ($2 billion per launch?) was the only way to keep everyone happy.

Now Musk has upset the apple cart (or you could say he's the one who has come along and proved the private sector can step up) SLS is less important. I expect it to be retired once Starship becomes operational. I expect Starship flight 3 to get to Hawaii -- it's akin to software development: the first version has huge bugs, but you have to run the code to find them. You tweak it and it runs better but still has problems. Eventually after rinse and repeat you perfect the product.

[Strahd Ivarius]

Re: The cow [used to] jump over the moon

So there will be another missile alert in Hawaii?

[Dave 126]

Re: The cow [used to] jump over the moon

> super-unreliable SLS

I thought the SLS had a success rate of 1 out of 1. For sure, I'd rather ride a rocket that had, say, a successful launch rate of 100 out of 100, but still.

[Anonymous Coward]

Bezo's rocket wont be going to mars. The payload will (assuming successful launch).

[Zebo-the-Fat]

But...

This is a company that hasn't managed to put anything into orbit yet!

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: But...

For the delivery of the payload, Amazon is relying on subcontractors usually...

[Richard 12]

Re: But...

Hence Class D

As another commentard mentioned, if they miss this launch window the next one is in 2026.

Not a huge issue if Amazon have to store it in the delivery depot for a couple of years.

NASA needs a viable alternative to SpaceX, as monopolies are almost universally bad.

SpaceX only really exist because NASA gave them similar contracts in the early days, makes sense to do the same to a realistic potential competitor.