Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin New Glenn rocket exploded in a pre-launch test at Cape Canaveral on Thursday, May 28, 2026.
The rocket burst into a giant fireball that engulfed the launch pad at 9 p.m. EDT (0100 UTC) as the engines ignited for a pre-launch test.
New Glenn was scheduled to launch a batch of satellites for another Bezos project, Amazon Leo, on Thursday, June 4.
Jeff Bezos took to social media and shared a post in which he wrote: “All personnel are accounted for and safe. It is too early to know the root cause, but we are already working to find it.
“A very tough day, but we will rebuild what is necessary and we will fly again. It is worth it.”
Blue Origin last week, on May 22, received the go-ahead from the Federal Aviation Administration to resume launches of its New Glenn rocket.
During the New Glenn 3 (NG-3) mission, the rocket encountered an in-flight malfunction in its upper stage.
This led to their escape by placing AST SpaceMobile’s BlueBird-7 satellite into the correct orbit.
The Amazon Leo satellites have not been moved to the launch site from their payload processing facilities to be installed on the rocket.
This was expected to be the first of 24 launches Amazon Leo scheduled on New Glenn rockets.
The incident is considered a major setback for NASA’s plans to build a lunar base and return humans to the Moon within the next two years.
For the uninitiated, Artemis III, scheduled for 2027, is scheduled to test Blue Origin’s Blue Moon lander and SpaceX’s Starship Human Landing System (HLS).
The tests will decide which of the two will take the Artemis IV crew of the Orion capsule to the surface of the moon.
