NASA had tapped Jeff Bezos’ rocket company to carry vehicles to the moon this year and had hoped to test its lunar lander in the Artemis III mission. Both now seem unlikely.

Blue Origin founder and billionaire Jeff Bezos said it was a ”very rough day” for the company, but it was too early to know the “root cause” of the incident.

Failure will likely delay US space agency’s efforts to beat China to the lunar surface.