Blue Origin New Glenn Third Launch Ends in Upper Stage Failure; FAA Grounds Rocket

Blue Origin's New Glenn heavy-lift rocket suffered an upper stage malfunction on its third-ever launch on April 19, 2026, stranding a commercial satellite in an incorrect and unrecoverable orbit. The rocket lifted off from Launch Complex 36 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station at 7:25 a.m. EDT, carrying AST SpaceMobile's BlueBird 7 satellite. Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp stated the company believes one of the upper stage's BE-3U engines 'didn't produce sufficient thrust' on the second GS2 burn, delivering the satellite to only a ~95-mile orbit instead of the target 285-mile orbit — too low to be sustainable. The satellite was declared lost and will reenter the atmosphere. Notably, New Glenn achieved a historic first: it successfully reused a booster for the first time, landing the same booster from its second mission on a drone ship in the ocean. The Federal Aviation Administration promptly classified the event as a 'mishap' and grounded New Glenn pending a formal investigation. The failure is significant for the Artemis program: Blue Origin holds a $3.4 billion NASA HLS contract to develop the Blue Moon Mk.2 crewed lunar lander for Artemis V (~2030), and the FAA grounding may affect the company's launch cadence and HLS development timeline.