Main Engine Cut OffBlue Origin Loses BE-4 Powerpack
We lost a set of powerpack test hardware on one of our BE-4 test stands yesterday. Not unusual during development.
Curious that the ultra-secretive Blue Origin said anything about this at all. Getting out in front of it is better than letting news of a test stand failure leak out. I doubt we’ll get any other details on it, but there are a lot of questions here.
It’s always a bummer to lose hardware, but they were headed into BE-4 testing with two stands and three engines, so that certainly makes the loss easier. We heard from ULA’s Tory Bruno back at the Space Symposium that full scale powerpack and preburner tests were going well, so let’s hope the issue can be identified and resolved quickly.