Blue Origin managed to reuse its New Glenn rocket for the first time on Sunday, marking a key milestone for the company, but the mission fell short of its main goal after failing to properly deliver a communications satellite into orbit for AST SpaceMobile.
The satellite, called BlueBird 7, was successfully released from the rocket and powered on, but AST SpaceMobile later confirmed that it was placed into an orbit lower than expected. That altitude is not sufficient to support operations, meaning the satellite will eventually be de-orbited and burn up in Earth’s atmosphere.
AST SpaceMobile said the financial impact is covered by insurance and noted that more BlueBird satellites are already in production, with the next ones expected to be ready in about a month. The company added that it works with multiple launch providers and still plans to send up 45 more satellites by the end of 2026.
This mission marks the first major setback for Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket, which only made its debut in January 2025 after years of development. It was also just the second time the rocket carried a commercial payload, following a previous mission that launched two NASA spacecraft headed toward Mars. Blue Origin has not provided further details about what went wrong.
The issue appears to be linked to the rocket’s upper stage, raising concerns that could extend beyond this single mission. Blue Origin is aiming to become a key launch partner for NASA’s Artemis program, which is focused on returning humans to the moon. Both NASA and the current US administration have been pushing companies like Blue Origin and SpaceX to move quickly on building and launching lunar landers.
Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp has said the company is committed to accelerating those efforts, even as it continues testing its own lunar lander, which could launch later this year without a crew. The company had previously considered using New Glenn’s third mission for that lander but chose to prioritize the AST SpaceMobile satellite instead.
Despite the setback, the launch itself began smoothly. The New Glenn rocket lifted off from Cape Canaveral, Florida, at 7:35 a.m. local time. It was the first time the company reused a previously flown booster, the same one used in its earlier mission. Around 10 minutes after liftoff, the booster returned and landed successfully on a drone ship in the ocean, repeating its earlier performance. Jeff Bezos later shared footage of the landing on X, where Elon Musk also responded with congratulations.
However, about two hours after launch, Blue Origin confirmed that the upper stage had placed the satellite into what it described as an off-nominal orbit. No additional details have been shared since.
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Blue Origin’s approach of carrying real customer payloads this early in New Glenn’s development stands in contrast to SpaceX, which has used test payloads while refining its Starship rocket. Still, SpaceX has faced similar setbacks in the past, including a Falcon 9 failure in 2015 that destroyed a cargo mission to the International Space Station, and another explosion in 2016 during ground testing that resulted in the loss of a communications satellite.
