Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin rockets grounded after fatal error dooms $23M mission
What goes up must come down, but when you're trying to put things up in space, that's not always the mantra you're abiding by. After all, if the human race is supposed to colonize the Moon and eventually Mars, the whole idea is that some of us will never be coming back down.
The space race is back on, but while it was once the USA versus Russia, it's now SpaceX versus Blue Origin. Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos are currently moving in very different cosmic circles as one works on space exploration and the other on space tourism, although they're in danger of stepping on each other's toes in the satellite scene. You might think it's pretty roomy in space, but with us having previously covered fears of the terrifying Kessler syndrome, it's already getting a little crowded up there.
Blue Origin has come under fire for putting Katy Perry up in space (for 11 minutes), a September 2022 booster failure triggering the launch escape system during a flight, and delays to its reusable New Glenn rocket being launched into orbit.
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The latest misstep was only the third launch of the New Glenn rocket since January 2025, so it's not great that it's already stumbling. Then again, SpaceX has arguably faced worse fumbles when its Starship exploded in a dramatic fireball.
April 19 was supposed to be a time for celebration, with Blue Origin reusing one of its New Glenn rocket boosters and sending an AST SpaceMobile satellite into its growing network of devices. Although Jeff Bezos cheered the rocket's successful landing on the 'Jacklyn' drone ship, AST SpaceMobile is likely to be a little less impressed.
As reported by Barron's, the BlueBird 7 satellite didn't get the right lift and ended up in a lower-than-planned orbit. With an estimated cost of $21 to $23 million per satellite, deorbiting it will now also have to be absorbed by AST SpaceMobile’s insurance policy.
Despite the setback and AST SpaceMobile stocks dipping by 34% from a year-to-date high on January 29, it's still targeting 45 satellites in orbit by the end of the year.
This would've been the company's eighth satellite added to the network, but undeterred, production through to BlueBird 32 continues as BlueBird 8 to 10 are supposed to be ready to ship in around 30 days.
Blue Origin will now investigate what went wrong with oversight from the Federal Aviation Administration, but in the meantime, its rocket remains grounded.
In general, Bezos is continuing to snap at the heels of Musk's Starlink with Blue Origin's TerraWave project that plans to put 'thousands' of satellites into low Earth orbit. As part of this, Amazon has acquired Globalstar as its own satellite manufacturer and operator for $11 billion, with endeavors to build out its own Leo project to rival SpaceX's Starlink. Still, Amazon only has around 200 satellites in orbit when compared to Starlink's 10,000.
With the New Glenn investigation potentially taking months, it could force AST SpaceMobile to turn to SpaceX to move things forward. More than this, Bezos might also be knocking at Mr. Musk's door to ensure Leo remains on track.