A devastating rocket explosion in Florida threatens to delay U.S. President Donald Trump’s grand vision to return American astronauts to the moon by 2028 and build a lunar base.
One of the rockets NASA was relying on to get to the moon exploded on its launchpad Thursday night — a huge setback for Blue Origin, Jeff Bezos’ space company, as it aims to challenge Elon Musk’s SpaceX and build a rocket that can ferry cargo and humans into orbit and beyond.
The destruction at Cape Canaveral — and the resulting damage to the company’s only launchpad — will likely require months of extensive repairs. Blue Origin was set to launch a key moon mission on its New Glenn rocket this year that will now almost surely be delayed. NASA is trying to build a moon base on Trump’s expedited timeline and beat China to the lunar surface, and this setback could undermine that effort.
The “catastrophic explosion we saw like never before concerns us all,” said Rep. Mike Haridopolos, (R-Florida), whose district includes Cape Canaveral. “Clearly this will adjust some timetables, no doubt, but that’s why we want to do a thorough analysis today and moving forward.”
NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman flew to Cape Canaveral on Friday morning to meet with teams on site, according to the space agency.
“Spaceflight is unforgiving, and developing new heavy-lift launch capability is extraordinarily difficult,” Isaacman said in a post on X. “We will work with our partners to support a thorough investigation of this anomaly, assess near-term mission impacts, and get back to launching rockets.”
Blue Origin, when asked for comment, referred to its X post on the broad contours of the explosion.
Predicting exactly what happens next is difficult, as the company and government officials assess the damage. But early signs were grim.
With Blue Origin effectively sidelined for the near future, NASA will have to lean on SpaceX. The company last week had a mostly successful launch of its new mega Starship rocket. But it has had its fair share of setbacks and still has a long way to go before it can achieve NASA’s lunar goals.
The agency is relying on private companies such as Blue Origin and SpaceX to develop the technology for the mission, unlike in previous eras when NASA itself did the engineering and development work.
The space agency had hoped to test out lunar landers — which will ferry astronauts to the moon’s surface — from both companies next year. The mission, called Artemis III, would test key technology before NASA attempts a moon landing in 2028.
It’s not clear yet exactly how the explosion will affect Blue Origin’s progress, but one former NASA official estimated that the damaged launchpad could delay the company’s contribution to the moon campaign by a year.
“Between the infrastructure rebuilding and the investigation and return to flight for New Glenn, and the testing campaign for Artemis III, it’s going to be at least a year’s delay,” the official said, who, like others, was granted anonymity to speak candidly about the situation.
The Artemis III mission could still proceed next year if SpaceX is ready. But that would mean NASA bets big on one company’s unproven technology.
And the timing couldn’t be worse for Blue Origin.
Just this week, NASA announced that the company’s launches would be an essential part of putting the moon base’s building blocks in place. The agency said Blue Origin would launch its uncrewed lunar lander, Blue Moon Mark 1, this fall. The company also received a contract to ferry two lunar rovers to the surface in 2028 on the Mark 1 lander.
But with Blue Origin’s launchpad out of commission for many months, NASA needs to reconfigure those plans.
“This is a massive blow to NASA’s moon base ambitions,” said an industry representative. “The entire schedule for Moon Base I and II shifts to the right if they can’t get the vehicle back online.”
Blue Origin is working on a second launch pad in Florida, but it’s unclear whether that will be up and running any time soon.
After the incident, Bezos said in a statement on X that all personnel are accounted for and safe.
“Very rough day, but we’ll rebuild whatever needs rebuilding and get back to flying,” he said.” It’s worth it.”
