The Video of the Fairing Re-Entry of Blue Origin's New Glenn Rocket: Considering Their Reuse

In the past, we have had the opportunity to write about how Blue Origin (Jeff Bezos's aerospace company) is engaged on various fronts. For example, it is developing the lunar landers Blue Moon MK1 and Blue Moon MK2, as well as Blue Alchemist for the in-situ resource utilization on the Moon, the Blue Ring vehicle, or the reusable New Glenn rocket.

Cool video of New Glenn’s fairing re-entry. For this flight, we installed an exo-atmospheric reaction control system (RCS) in the fairing to control re-entry and enable recovery of the fairing. We’re planning a parachute recovery later this year, and the data from these fairings.

pic.twitter.com/3VBGlDP7i2 — Dave Limp (@davill) May 1, 2026

Regarding the latter, the NG-3 mission, which carried the AST SpaceMobile BlueBird 7 satellite into orbit, did not go well. As we reported, the satellite was placed in a lower orbit than expected, and the company decided to bring it back early into the atmosphere. Although it was a failed mission from the client's perspective, the first stage “Never Tell Me The Odds” (used during the NG-2 mission) successfully landed on the droneship Jacklyn.

The fairings of Blue Origin's New Glenn and their reuse

A few days later, Dave Limp (CEO of Blue Origin) showed a video in which we can see the re-entry of one of the halves of the fairing (the shells that protect the payload). These composite structures cost several million dollars and are usually used once. Currently, one operational exception is linked to SpaceX's Falcon 9, where the fairings are recovered and reused multiple times.

Blue Origin intends to apply the same strategy for New Glenn as well. It should be noted that the fairings of this vehicle are quite large, measuring as much as 7 meters, compared to the “standard” 5 meters (allowing for double the internal volume). This enables the U.S. company to accommodate one or more payloads by leveraging the capabilities of the rocket, especially when the more powerful configuration called New Glenn 9x4 arrives (9 BE-4 engines for the first stage and 4 BE-3U engines for the second stage, as opposed to the standard 7x2 version).

According to Limp, during the NG-3 mission, an exo-atmospheric Reaction Control System (RCS) was installed on the fairing. This system allowed for controlling the re-entry and recovery of the fairing. The system is still in testing, and it may take some time before we see the reuse of a fairing by Blue Origin.

Bezos's company is also planning to use a parachute that will be installed in one of the missions we will see later this year. During this mission and probably also the next ones, there will be an opportunity to collect data to recover the fairings, saving millions of dollars for Blue Origin, making New Glenn more cost-effective, although the “clash” with SpaceX's Starship will certainly be very complicated (the rapidly expanding market for space launches could still provide enough customers for various players).