LOS ANGELES: An unmanned Blue Origin New Glenn rocket exploded on a Florida launchpad during a test on Thursday, dealing a blow to Nasa’s lunar exploration plans and marking a major setback for Jeff Bezos’ space venture.

The towering rocket ignited on the pad before erupting into a massive fireball that sent a plume of flames and smoke skyward during a hot-fire test. The long-delayed New Glenn is supposed to play a central role in delivering lunar landers and cargo under Nasa’s Artemis missions.

Nasa Administrator Jared Isaacman said the agency will support an investigation into the anomaly and provide information on any impacts to its Artemis and Moon Base programs.

The explosion comes just two days after Nasa awarded Blue Origin a $188 million contract to land rovers on the moon’s surface.

“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 that it was too early to know the root cause.

Isaacman added on X: “Spaceflight is unforgiving, and developing new heavy-lift launch capability is extraordinarily difficult.”

Blue Origin was preparing the 29-story rocket for its fourth launch to deliver 48 Amazon Leo satellites into low-Earth orbit to rival Elon Musk’s Starlink network. The satellites were not integrated during the incident.

SpaceX, which recently carried out a largely successful Starship test, is competing with Blue Origin to design the lunar landers Nasa will use to return people to the moon ahead of a planned 2030 crewed mission by China.

Musk reacted to the explosion on X, writing, “Most unfortunate. Rockets are hard.”

Published in Dawn, May 30th, 2026