NATIONWIDE— Space will not be a destination for paying customers for a while, at least not through Blue Origin.
What You Need To Know
- Blue Origin stated it wants to focus on its “lunar capabilities”
- NASA has tapped Blue Origin and other companies for the Artemis III mission
The company announced Friday that it would pause its reusable New Shepard rocket flights for at least two years.
Those are the ones that sent passengers, including Katy Perry, Gayle King, Jeff Bezos, Michael Strahan, and William Shatner, above the Kármán line to experience weightlessness.
The majority of the passengers have not been celebrities who went beyond the line to the edge of space, at 62 miles/100 kilometers above the planet’s surface.
Blue Origin had run more than a dozen of those flights, with the most recent one having lifted off just over a week ago, on Jan. 22.
The company stated it will shift resources to accelerate its “lunar capabilities.”
“Blue Origin today announced it will pause its New Shepard flights and shift resources to further accelerate development of the company’s human lunar capabilities. The decision reflects Blue Origin’s commitment to the nation’s goal of returning to the Moon and establishing a permanent, sustained lunar presence,” stated Brett Griffin, director of Blue Origin’s public relations.
In October 2025, then NASA acting Administrator Sean Duffy said the U.S. space agency is considering Blue Origin and other companies to handle the task of returning humans to the moon’s surface because SpaceX’s Starship was behind schedule.
“Now, SpaceX had the contract for Artemis III. By the way, I love SpaceX and it’s an amazing company, but the problem is, they are behind. They pushed their timelines out and we are in a race against China. The president and I want to get to the moon in this president’s term. So, I’m going to open up the contract and I’m going let other space companies compete with SpaceX, like Blue Origin. Whatever one gets us there first to the moon, we are going to take. If SpaceX is behind and Blue Origin can do it before them, good on Blue Origin,” he wrote on X at the time.
During a September 2025 media tour of Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket facility in Florida, Spectrum News asked U.S. Rep. Mike Haridopolos, who is the chairman of the U.S. Space and Aeronautics Subcommittee, if NASA had any backup plans if Starship was behind schedule.
He only said that the only focus at that time was Artemis II, which will see four astronauts flyby the moon in NASA’s Space Launch System rocket and the Orion spacecraft.
Blue Origin’s Blue Moon Mark 1 lunar lander is set to have an uncrewed launch to land on the moon sometime in 2026, and the Blue Moon Mark 2 lunar lander will be taking humans back to the moon’s surface for the Artemis V mission.
Spectrum News Staff, Anthony Leone
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