Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket exploded in a huge fireball during a test in Florida: What you need to know

An uncrewed rocket belonging to Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin exploded into a massive fireball Thursday night during a launchpad test.

Videos showed the 320-foot-tall New Glenn rocket igniting on the pad at Cape Canaveral, Fla., at around 9 p.m. local time, before erupting into a bright orange ball of fire, engulfing the surrounding area and shaking nearby homes.

Blue Origin confirmed it had experienced an “anomaly” during a so-called “hot-fire” test, which is when a rocket is fired up while remaining anchored to the ground.

"Very rough day, but we'll rebuild whatever needs rebuilding and get back to flying. It’s worth it," Bezos said in a post on X, adding it was “too early to know the root cause” of what happened.

Bezos confirmed that all personnel were safe and accounted for.

Elon Musk, Bezos’s primary rival in the commercial space race, posted on X, “Sorry to see this, I hope you recover quickly,“ adding it was: “Most unfortunate. Rockets are hard.”

NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said in a statement: “We will work with our partners to support a thorough investigation of this anomaly, assess near-term mission impacts, and get back to launching rockets.”

Space Launch Delta of the U.S. Space Force, which is responsible for all space launch operations from the East Coast, said officials were working with Blue Origin to determine the exact cause of the incident, adding, “These operations often involve developmental systems and emerging technologies, and the nature of such testing carries inherent risk, including the potential for anomalies.”

The explosion follows another recent incident affecting Bezos’s rocket. In April, the New Glenn rocket was temporarily grounded by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) after a failed launch that left a satellite in the wrong orbit.

Dr. Maggie Lieu, an astrophysicist at the University of Nottingham in the U.K., said the incident was a “massive setback,” coming a week after the FAA grounding had been lifted.

“We thought it was quite a quick turnover that they were able to go from a grounded rocket to back on the launchpad so quickly. This is huge damage. The whole launch facility has gone, so it’s going to take many, many months to get back on board and then for the FAA to re-clear this, because this is a mishap.”

What challenges is Blue Origin facing?

The explosion is the latest setback for Bezos's Blue Origin in the company's ongoing space race rivalry with Musk's SpaceX.

The billionaires want to dominate commercial space travel, and both Blue Origin and SpaceX have been selected by NASA to eventually land astronauts on the moon.

Despite the years-long rivalry, Bezos has recently spoken admiringly of his competitor. "Great industries are made up of many companies," he told CNBC earlier this month, adding that he admires what SpaceX has achieved.

SpaceX completed 165 rocket launches in 2025, more than the rest of the world combined. However, its Starship rocket — the largest ever built — has suffered multiple failures, and its latest test ended with a booster crashing into the sea.

Blue Origin’s New Glenn has also had a difficult journey. Two rocket sections were damaged at the company's factory in 2024. The rocket's first launch in January 2025 reached orbit, but its booster failed to land back on its ship at sea as planned. A second launch later that year went smoothly.

But a third flight on April 19 left a commercial satellite stranded in the wrong orbit after a fault in the rocket's upper stage, forcing the FAA to ground the vehicle while it investigated. Blue Origin blamed a bad engine for the issue.

Earlier this week, NASA announced it had awarded Blue Origin a $188 million contract for New Glenn to deliver rovers to the moon's surface. The contracts are part of NASA's broader Artemis program, which aims to establish a lunar base, where astronauts can live and work long-term with the ultimate goal of studying the moon and its origins.

Isaacman said NASA would provide further information on any impacts to the Artemis and Moon Base programs as it becomes available.

What is the purpose of Blue Origin?

Blue Origin was founded by Bezos in 2000 with the stated aim of reducing the cost of space travel and space tourism, and turning it into an effective business model that eventually can be affordable to people other than the ultra-wealthy.

The company achieved major success when it launched an unmanned rocket in 2015, and then hit headlines worldwide when Bezos and his brother took part in the company’s first manned spaceflight in 2021.

In April 2025, Katy Perry and Bezos’s wife Lauren Sanchez were among a group of six women who took part in Blue Origin's 11th and most high-profile tourist space flight.

The company has designed two flagship rockets, New Shepard and New Glenn, to be reusable, dramatically reducing the cost of each flight, as they do not need to be replaced each time.