Ars Technica hosted a live discussion this week about the New Glenn explosion and what it means for NASA’s Moon plans. The answer: not great, and probably not soon.
Eric Berger, Caleb Henry from Quilty Space, and Anthony Colangelo from Main Engine Cut Off talked through the aftermath of Blue Origin’s New Glenn failure in late May. The rocket exploded during a static fire test, taking out Launch Complex 36A in the process.
The big question is Artemis IV. NASA needs landers to get humans back on the Moon. Both Blue Origin and SpaceX are building them, and both need their rockets to work.
Blue Origin’s current plan requires four launches of a new New Glenn variant called the 9×4 — nine first-stage engines, four upper-stage engines. That’s a more powerful version than the 7×2 that exploded. No target date has been set, but sources say late 2027 or early 2028.
Henry wasn’t optimistic. “I have not seen anyone put out a date for a new rocket and actually hit it,” he said. Adding more engines makes things more complicated, not less. He estimated at least 18 months of delay.
Colangelo went further. He wouldn’t be surprised if the 9×4 variant slips into the 2030s. If that happens, NASA’s plan to land astronauts on the Moon this decade gets a lot harder — maybe impossible.
SpaceX is the other option with Starship, but that rocket has its own development timeline and regulatory hurdles. The bottom line: the US needs heavy lift capability, and both providers are further away than anyone wants to admit.
