After long delays, Bezos' Blue Origin to attempt space debut on Sunday

After more than a decade of development, hype and pent-up demand, Jeff Bezos' aerospace venture Blue Origin will at long last attempt to put a rocket into orbit.

New Glenn, originally intended to launch as early as 2020, is slated to fly on Sunday out of Cape Canaveral, Florida, during a nearly four-hour launch window.

The mission aims to put a Blue Origin test satellite into orbit and then land the rocket's lower portion on a drone ship in the Atlantic Ocean.


The flight will serve as a critical demonstration for Blue Origin, which has struggled for years to execute on its ambitious plans for space exploration. Though the company has shuttled paying tourists to the edge of space and back, it has lacked the capability of sending people and satellites to orbit.

That stands in stark contrast to Elon Musk's SpaceX, which has been in operation for much of the same time as Blue Origin but has far surpassed Bezos' firm in launch capability. SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket is the most prolific orbital vehicle globally. Like Musk, Bezos is one of the world's richest people with numerous business interests, including having founded Amazon.com Inc. and owning the Washington Post.

Bezos formally announced plans for New Glenn in 2016, though the rocket had been in development many years prior, with a goal of flying it before the end of the decade.

But Blue Origin ran into numerous hurdles and delays - particularly with the development of the vehicle's main BE-4 engines, built in-house. The engines were finished years behind schedule but have since successfully powered the United Launch Alliance's Vulcan rocket.

A successful launch of New Glenn would at last put the company in an elite circle of US ventures that can send satellites to orbit, as well as put Blue Origin on a path toward challenging SpaceX's ironclad grip on the launch market.

But perhaps even more critical for the company, New Glenn stands to become the centerpiece for Bezos and his long-term dreams for the future of spaceflight.