NASA has announced the four-person crew for its Artemis III lunar mission as the space agency presses ahead with its 2027 launch plans despite Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket exploding last month

It could be more than a year before Blue Origin's New Glenn is ready to fly again, but NASA has no intention of letting the Artemis timeline slip.

Exploding rockets are nothing new in the launch business. Launch vehicles routinely blew up on the launch pad in the early years of the Space Age. The only rocket bigger than New Glenn to fail with a full load of fuel on or near its launch pad was the Soviet Union’s N1 rocket more than 50 years ago.

Amazon’s satellite internet division has sought to calm employee concern after last week’s Blue Origin New Glenn rocket explosion, which founder Jeff Bezos described as a ‘very rough day’. The incident took place during a hot-fire test at Cape Canaveral,