Blue Origin‘s scrub at the countdown of the launch of its first New Glenn heavy-lift rocket at 1:00 a.m. EST (0600 GMT) on Friday, January 10, was called due to rough weather in the Atlantic Ocean — where part of the rocket is expected to land, resulting in a two-day delay.
The launch is now set for Sunday, January 12, at the same time from Blue Origin’s pad at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. You’ll be able to watch the New Glenn launch live on Space.com, courtesy of Blue Origin.
“We’re shifting our NG-1 launch date to no earlier than January 12 due to a high sea state in the Atlantic where we hope to land our booster,” Blue Origin wrote in a statement on the social media site X today, January 9. “Our three-hour window remains the same, opening Sunday at 1 a.m. EST (0600 UTC).
Additional news:
Just days before Blue Origin’s launch the company was fined for a previous New Glenn test conducted without a permit in which the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP) issued a $3,000 fine, adding up to a $3,250 plus costs, to Blue Origin for the unauthorized use of a water deluge system during a static fire test of its New Glenn rocket, according to local media reports.
In September 2024, Blue Origin ran a fueling test of its upcoming rocket at Launch Complex 36 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida. The hot fire test lasted for 15 seconds, and its purpose was to “validate interactions between the subsystems on the second stage, its two BE-3U engines, and the ground control systems,” Blue Origin wrote in a statement at the time. The FDEP, however, had not yet issued Blue Origin the required permission to use the launch pad’s water deluge system, but the company went ahead and used it anyway, resulting in the fine.