A BATTLE of billionaires will escalate this week as Jeff Bezos prepares for a daring rocket launch to rival Elon Musk’s SpaceX.
The Amazon founder’s space company Blue Origin is set to launch its first orbital rocket in a matter of days.
Musk, the world’s wealthiest person, currently dominates the commercial space race.
But Bezos, the second-richest human alive, hopes that his New Glenn rocket will provide some serious off-Earth competition if this week’s launch is successful.
The rocket is scheduled to blast off as soon as 6am London time on Wednesday, January 8.
That’s 1am local time at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station launch site in Florida.
It could also take place on Friday during a back-up launch window.
Blue Origin has already made several suborbital flights using the New Shepard rocket.
This smaller rocket can carry equipment and even passengers to the edge of space.
But Blue Origin’s NG-1 mission this week will make a six-hour test flight into orbit.
It will by carrying a spacecraft called Blue Ring, which is funded by the United States Department of Defence.
The prototype craft is meant to be used for deploying satellites, which could be a big money-spinner for Blue Origin.
If the mission is a success, Blue Origin could win valuable contracts for flying gear into Earth‘s orbit.
“The market is really orbital,” said Astralytical analyst Laura Forczyk, speaking to AFK.
“Suborbital can only take you so far – there are only so many payloads and customers for a quick ride to space.”
Blue Origin says that its New Glenn rocket is designed for “a minimum of 25 flights”.
It says that this reusability will allow it to operate like a commercial airliner, reducing waste and cost.
The rocket offers 23-foot payload fairings, allowing for a large amount of equipment to be stored on board.
Blue Origin claims that the rocket will be able to carry 45 metric tons of payload to low Earth orbit – or 13 metric tons to geostationary transfer orbit (GTO).
GTO is where satellites are initially dropped to enter a circular geostationary orbit, allowing them to stay above a fixed point on Earth.
Here's what you need to know about the Blue Origin rocket...
Development began – Pre-2013
Announced – 2016
First orbital launch due – No earlier than January 8, 2025
Cost to develop – $2.5 billion
Cost per launch – $68 million
Height – 322 feet
Diameter – 23 feet
Stages – two
Mass (payload to low-earth orbit) – 99,000lbs
Mass (payload to geostationary transfer orbit, for satellite launches) – 30,000lbs
Mass (payload to trans-lunar injection, for sending spacecraft to the Moon) – 15,000lbs
Picture Credit: Blue Origin
So Bezos will be hoping to bag contracts to ship satellites into space.
“A reusable rocket purpose-built to deliver high volume and mass to orbit, New Glenn is a key to unlocking our long-term vision,” Blue Origin explained.
“A future where people and heavy industries are moved into space to preserve Earth, humanity’s blue origin.”
The New Glenn rocket is more than 320 feet tall.
Blue Original says this makes it “one of the largest vehicles ever built”.
It will be competing with SpaceX‘s 230-foot Falcon 9, which has already been used for top jobs from Nasa and the Pentagon.
Astronauts even use the rockets for their trips to the International Space Station.
“If I were still a senior executive at NASA, I’d be thrilled to finally have some competition to the Falcon 9,” said former Nasa director G. Scott Hubbard, speaking to AFP.
Hubbard, now at Stanford University, revealed that Blue Origin’s rockets could help drive down the cost of space launches – due to increased competition.
