Blue Origin’s New Glenn Upper Stage Puts AST SpaceMobile’s BlueBird 7 Into Wrong Orbit

Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket flew on its third mission and achieved its first successful reflight of an orbital-class booster, but the launch ended with a setback when the upper stage placed AST SpaceMobile’s BlueBird 7 satellite into an “off-nominal orbit,” or the wrong orbit, Blue Origin said in a post on X.

Fortune reported that the rocket took off from the launchpad at Cape Canaveral, Florida at approximately 7:25 a.m. local time, and that the reusable first stage returned to Earth at 7:35 am, touching down on a barge in the Atlantic Ocean.

Ars Technica

Ars Technica described the vehicle as a 321-foot-tall (98-meter) New Glenn launch vehicle that ignited its seven methane-fueled BE-4 engines at 7:25 am EDT (11:25 UTC) Sunday, then switched off and fell away from the upper stage powered by two BE-3U engines burning liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen.

SpaceNews said the rocket lifted off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station’s Launch Complex 36 at 7:25 a.m. Eastern, 40 minutes into a two-hour window for the NG-3 mission, after a countdown held for an unspecified technical issue.

TechCrunch reported that AST SpaceMobile issued a statement that the upper stage placed BlueBird 7 into an orbit that was “lower than planned,” and that while the satellite successfully separated and powered on, the altitude was too low “to sustain operations” and it would be de-orbited.

Multiple outlets tied the failure to the second stage’s performance: CBS News said “the second stage put the payload…in an unusable orbit,” while Spaceflight Now said Blue Origin confirmed “the payload was placed into an off-nominal orbit” and that it was assessing the satellite.

The episode also highlighted the mission’s partial success: Spaceflight Now said the booster, ‘Never Tell Me the Odds’, previously launched in November 2025 and successfully touched down on the company’s ocean-going landing platform, ‘Jacklyn’, and Ars Technica said the landing was “on-target” less than 10 minutes after liftoff.

Across coverage, the launch timeline combined a smooth booster recovery with a later upper-stage problem that prevented the satellite from reaching its intended operating conditions.

Spaceflight Now said liftoff of the liquid methane and liquid hydrogen fueled rocket from pad 36 was scheduled during a two-hour launch window that opens Sunday, April 19 at 6:45 a.m. EDT (1045 UTC), and it described the south-easterly trajectory on departure from the Space Coast.

CBS News

Ars Technica reported that the main engines accelerated the rocket past the speed of sound in about a minute-and-a-half, and that “Three minutes into the flight, the booster switched off its engines and fell away from New Glenn’s upper stage.”

It then described the first stage continuing a downrange parabolic arc and guiding itself toward Blue Origin’s landing platform in the Atlantic Ocean nearly 400 miles southeast of Cape Canaveral, with reigniting engines for two braking burns and a touchdown “less than 10 minutes after liftoff.”

SpaceNews added that the payload was scheduled to deploy about 75 minutes after liftoff into a 460-kilometer circular orbit at an inclination of 49.4 degrees, with separation planned for five minutes after a second burn of the upper stage’s BE-3U engines lasting 68 seconds.

It said that Blue Origin ended its launch webcast after the successful landing of its first stage and did not provide updates about the burn or payload deployment when they were scheduled to occur.

About an hour after the scheduled payload separation, SpaceNews reported that Blue Origin confirmed on social media that BlueBird 7 had separated and powered on, but that “The payload was placed into an off-nominal orbit. We are currently assessing and will update when we have more detailed information.”

While the satellite was lost for operational purposes, the coverage emphasized that AST SpaceMobile said the satellite’s cost would be recovered and that the spacecraft would be de-orbited.

“Blue Origin launched the company's third Sunday, re-flying and successfully recovering a previously used first stage”

CBS News

TechCrunch reported that AST SpaceMobile said the cost of the loss of the satellite was covered by AST SpaceMobile’s insurance policy, and it also said there were successive BlueBird satellites that would be completed in around a month.

UPI likewise described the satellite’s placement into “an off-nominal orbit,” and it quoted AST’s statement that “While the satellite separated from the launch vehicle and powered on, the altitude is too low to sustain operations with its on-board thruster technology and will de-orbited,” adding that “The cost of the satellite is expected to be recovered under the company’s insurance policy.”

CBS News stated that “The cost of the satellite was not revealed, but the company said it was fully insured,” and it reiterated that the on-board propulsion system could not compensate for the lower-than-planned altitude.

SpaceNews provided additional orbital detail from U.S. Space Force tracking data, saying the upper stage and satellite were in an initial parking orbit of 154 by 494 kilometers and an inclination of 36.1 degrees, and it noted that Blue Origin did not release the details of that parking orbit before the second burn.

Space.com’s account similarly described the sequence of updates, saying Blue Origin acknowledged a problem on social media at 9:40 a.m. EDT (1340 GMT) with the statement about “off-nominal orbit,” and then AST SpaceMobile issued its own update that “the altitude is too low to sustain operations with its on-board thruster technology and will [be] de-orbited.”

GeekWire added that after the booster touchdown, “the focus shifted to the mission’s primary objective: deploying BlueBird 7,” and it described the delay in issuing an update until “We have confirmed payload separation. AST SpaceMobile has confirmed the satellite has powered on. The payload was placed into an off-nominal orbit,” as Blue Origin posted on X.

The wrong-orbit outcome landed at a moment when Blue Origin was trying to scale launch cadence and compete for NASA lunar work, with multiple outlets linking the failure to Artemis timelines and commercial expectations.

Fortune framed New Glenn as “years behind schedule” and said the unexpected issue could mark a setback for Blue Origin’s ambitious plans and its reputation as an alternative launch provider to SpaceX’s Falcon 9.

Fortune

It also reported that Blue Origin Chief Executive Officer Dave Limp would like to launch eight to 12 flights this year, and that he said in a Bloomberg Television interview ahead of the launch, “We have plenty of hardware to do that,” adding “And by the way I think demand is going up.”

Spaceflight Now described the company’s target cadence in more operational terms, saying Blue Origin said it’s designing its boosters to support up to 25 flights each, and it quoted AST SpaceMobile’s Chairman and CEO Abel Avellan saying, “We remain on track to achieve our target of deploying 45 to 60 satellites into low Earth orbit by the end of this year.”

Ars Technica connected the mission to NASA’s Artemis lunar program, calling New Glenn a “key element in NASA’s Artemis lunar program,” and it described the rocket as a “flagship” for Jeff Bezos’ program.

TechCrunch explicitly tied the failure to NASA and the Trump administration’s pressure, saying “The space agency — and the Trump administration — has put pressure on Blue Origin and SpaceX to be able to put landers on the moon by the end of President Donald Trump’s second term,” and it added that Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp said his company “will move heaven and Earth” to help NASA get back to the moon faster.

Fortune also said Blue Origin and SpaceX both hold contracts with NASA to develop lunar landers and are competing to meet the deadline of the space agency’s planned moon landing mission in 2028, while it reported that Blue Origin’s Mark 1 lunar lander has “a very good chance” of landing on the moon later this year.

The same launch failure was framed differently across the technology press and mainstream business coverage, with some outlets foregrounding the booster reuse milestone while others emphasized the operational failure’s implications for reliability.

“Blue Origin’s flagship New Glenn rocket launched to space on its third flight, reusing a booster for the first time but failing to correctly place the satellite it was carrying into its intended orbit”

Fortune

Fortune highlighted the reflight success and the immediate technical outcome, writing that the rocket “reusing a booster for the first time” but “failing to correctly place the satellite it was carrying into its intended orbit,” and it described the satellite entering an “off-nominal orbit” as Blue Origin assessed it.

Gizmodo en Español

Spaceflight Now similarly treated the mission as a “critical milestone” for New Glenn’s heavy-lift rocket, focusing on the booster reuse and the planned deployment of BlueBird 7 into low Earth orbit during a window that opened April 19 at 6:45 a.m. EDT.

Ars Technica, by contrast, led with the reuse achievement “marred by upper stage failure,” and it described the upper stage switch-off and fall-away sequence before centering the setback for Jeff Bezos’ flagship rocket and NASA’s Artemis lunar program.

TechCrunch framed the event as “New Glenn put a customer satellite in the wrong orbit during its third launch,” and it connected the mishap to broader implications for NASA’s Artemis logistics and the need for reliability under political pressure.

SpaceNews emphasized the technical chain of events and the “malfunction of its second stage,” reporting that the payload was stranded in an unrecoverable “off-nominal” orbit and that AST said the orbit was too low for electric propulsion to recover.

GeekWire combined both angles, calling it “In a first, Blue Origin uses a recycled rocket to send a satellite into orbit — unfortunately, it’s the wrong orbit,” and it described the cheering at Mission Control alongside AST’s statement that the altitude was too low to sustain operations.