Blue Origin's New Glenn finally roared into orbit in the early hours of Thursday, with SpaceX's Starship rocket set to launch hours later.

Jeff Bezos' spaceflight company Blue Origin on Thursday launched its new mega-rocket, called New Glenn, into orbit for the first time. The rocket lifted

The world’s second richest man suffered an embarrassing botched launch of his new rocket system just hours after shrugging off speculation he might be intimidated by Elon Musk having the incoming president’s ear on all things off-world.

Blue Origin, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos' space company, launched its large rocket for the first time early Thursday.

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Shrugging off bad weather, Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin launched its powerful New Glenn rocket on its maiden flight early Thursday, lighting up a cloudy overnight sky as it climbed away from Cape Canaveral in a high-stakes bid to compete with Elon Musk's industry-leading SpaceX.

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk took to X on Thursday night to explain what his company believes may have caused part of the Starship rocket to experience a "rapid unscheduled disassembly."

The New Glenn rocket was due to take off from Cape Canaveral in Florida for the first time in the early hours of Monday morning but the launch was cancelled after several delays

Blue Origin, the rocket company founded by Jeff Bezos in 2000, waved off an attempt to launch its first orbital rocket. Blue Origin said engineers worked to troubleshoot an issue with the rocket but could not resolve the problem in time.

Named after the first American to orbit Earth, the New Glenn rocket blasted off from Florida, soaring from the same pad used to launch NASA’s Mariner and Pioneer spacecraft a half-century ago.

Blue Origin's New Glenn successfully reached orbit on its first-ever flight, putting it in competition with SpaceX for heavy-lift missions.