Blue Origin’s next launch from the Space Coast could still be its uncrewed and newly named Blue Moon MK1 lander, but it will have to take a trip to Houston and back before it can get to the moon.

The company posted to social media Tuesday an image of the lander, packaged up for safe travels, leaving the company’s Space Coast manufacturing facilities and headed for Port Canaveral.

“Introducing Endurance. Named for Ernest Shackleton’s legendary ship that journeyed to Earth’s South Pole, MK1 honors resilience under pressure. That same spirit of perseverance guides our mission to the lunar south pole,” the post reads.

Blue Moon MK1 left for the port today ahead of shipment to Houston.

Introducing Endurance. Named for Ernest Shackleton’s legendary ship that journeyed to Earth’s South Pole, MK1 honors resilience under pressure. That same spirit of perseverance guides our mission to the lunar… pic.twitter.com/ofNoXwIDq1

— Blue Origin (@blueorigin) January 20, 2026

The lander is headed to NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston for thermal vacuum chamber testing. It will eventually be shipped back to the Space Coast where it’s to be launched atop a New Glenn rocket from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station’s Launch Complex 36.

Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp posted last week that teams had completed direct field acoustic testing.

“We surrounded the fully integrated lander with a ring of 34‑foot speaker towers to generate a near‑diffuse acoustic field, matching the New Glenn payload fairing environment at over 138 decibels overall sound pressure level,” he wrote.

The testing had the lander in a flight-like configuration he said, with pressurized tanks, on full battery power with all critical avionics and guidance systems in operation.

This week we completed direct field acoustic testing on our Blue Moon MK1 lunar lander, a major flight‑qualification milestone. 
 
We surrounded the fully integrated lander with a ring of 34‑ft speaker towers to generate a near‑diffuse acoustic field, matching the New Glenn… pic.twitter.com/ngfSXw0s36

— Dave Limp (@davill) January 15, 2026

“Because the lander’s vibration environment is driven by acoustic loads, this test replaces traditional shaker-based vibration testing and more accurately represents ascent conditions,” Limp said.

To date, Blue Origin has launched New Glenn twice. This lunar mission, which includes one NASA payload and is part of NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services program, has been on tap to be the third New Glenn launch.

It could also be one of four CLPS missions to the moon launching from the Space Coast this year.

Other launches on tap include:

– The third flight from Intuitive Machines, which saw its Nova-C lander make it to the moon’s surface twice, in 2024 and 2025, but tip over both times.

– A second attempt from Astrobotic with its large Griffin lander, which follows an unsuccessful attempt to reach the moon in 2024 with its smaller Peregrine lander.

– A second mission from Firefly Aerospace, which saw its Blue Ghost lander stick the landing last year to become the first commercial company to complete its CLPS mission objectives.

Blue Origin’s MK1 lander would be the first lunar-bound mission for Jeff Bezos’ company. A larger Blue Moon MK2 lander is designed to support NASA’s Artemis program as a human landing system. Both landers are manufactured on the Space Coast.

While Blue Origin was originally contracted for the Artemis V mission, NASA reopened the lunar landing contract for Artemis III to prompt competition with SpaceX with its Starship program.

Artemis III is slated to be the NASA mission to return humans to the lunar surface for the first time since the end of the Apollo program in 1972. NASA wants to fly it before the end of 2028.

NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman, who flew to space twice with SpaceX, said during his confirmation hearings in December that he welcomed the competition.

“Both SpaceX and Blue Origin were already awarded contracts through a competitive process to build a lander. And I don’t think it was lost on either one of those organizations that the first company that is capable of delivering a lander to take American astronauts to the lunar surface and back is the one that this nation is going to go with,” he said. “I think that competition is fantastic. I think the best thing for SpaceX is a Blue Origin right on their heels and vice versa.”

Isaacman on Saturday noted both Blue Origin and SpaceX have made progress with plans to accelerate each of their moon landers’ programs.

“We will just continue to be as transparent as we can as we make progress toward the Artemis III mission, the way the public can best follow on and probably measure progress is just observing launch rate,” he said. “That is absolutely the key to unlocking the capability that will be necessary to bring our lander to the lunar environment and bring astronauts down to the surface.”

He said both companies’ plans reduce technical risks from previous iterations, but noted hurdles such as figuring out how to transfer propellants in space so the landers can make the 220,000-mile trip to the moon after launch are considerable. He especially hammered home the idea of reusability for the rockets that get the landers to space.

“In the end, it’s going to come down to launching vehicles very frequently to learn,” he said. “I’d say if we are on track, we should be watching an awful lot of New Glenns and Starships launch in the years ahead.”