Mission Milestone: Putting NASA ESCAPADE in Deep Space Orbit and on a Path to Study the Life Cycle of Stars
On 13 November 2025, NASA’s ESCAPADE (Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorers) twin spacecraft mission was successfully launched by the New Glenn heavy-lift rocket of Blue Origin. The two orbiters—named “Blue” and “Gold”—will investigate how the solar wind interacts with Mars’ magnetic environment, and how that plays into the loss of its atmosphere. During the launch, the rocket took off from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station launch pad and performed a successful separation sequence just over three minutes after liftoff. The upper stage then pushed the spacecraft into loiter orbit, a move that put them on course for Mars, where they are expected to arrive around 2027.
It is unique in that it maintains a relative low cost (at under US $80 million) against much more expensive Mars programs, and it also has an original trajectory which evolves the spacecraft away from Earth-Sun gravitational regions before swinging by Mars.
Reusability Milestone: New Glenn’s First Stage Successfully Lands
As equally significant is the succeed of the New Glenn first-stage booster performing a controlled vertical landing aboard “Jacklyn” – a sea-based platform named after Jack Bezos’s mother. For the first time, this 321-ft (98 m) tall heavy-lift vehicle has flown a science mission for NASA and landed its first stage. The booster used its BE-4 engines to perform a series of deceleration burns prior to landing. Its attempt to land on its maiden flight earlier in the year was unsuccessful, but this time Blue Origin got it right.
By accomplishing both interplanetary payload deployment and booster recovery on the same mission, Blue Origin advances its aim of establishing reusable-rocket operations and being more directly competitive in the heavy-launch arena. With that success, the company can now reuse the booster for additional missions, drive down launch costs and develop its manifest of customers — including government, telecom and commercial space-internet providers.
