Jeff Foust @jeff_foust: "Bob Smith, Blue Origin, stresses importance of ..." "Smith: had really good test recently on what we think is the last dev version of the BE-4 engine; expect to finish qualification of the engine this year. #SATShow" Jeff Foust on Twitter That sounds lot better.
Glad to see BO is making progress. But I dislike their superior attitude: their engines are “meant to actually be a road into space”. As if that is something that no other company is doing, and that everyone else is just building rockets with no long term goals in mind. SpaceX is in volume production with Raptors right now, and appears to be well ahead of BO in terms of building that “road”.
External communications team member #1: "How about 'meant to be the road to space'...?" #2: "Hmmm...not sure we can say that, I thought someone else was doing that too?" #3: "I got it! I got it!" <changes *the* to *a*> All: <High fives around>
Finally ready to begin production. ULA is waiting. New Glenn can hopefully launch. With turbopump issues “sorted out,” BE-4 rocket engine moves into production