As a tech billionaire Amazon founder Jeff Bezos can afford almost everything – one of the largest online retailers in the world, an equally large cloud service and a newspaper. Less known is that he also owns an aerospace company, with which he extensively wants people into space. Yesterday it tested its first missile.
Bezos founded his space company Blue Origin in 2000. Since then, little was heard of the company, the company shall hardly out. Until yesterday, when it posted a video of their first test with the New Shepard rocket from a base in the US Texas:
Rocket not reuse
The missile was about 93 kilometers (307,000 feet) into space, where a – empty – compartment for six astronauts successfully undocked and came with a parachute back to Earth.
The rocket itself was less well. The intention was to create a reusable rocket, a key step in reducing the cost of commercial space. But the rocket crashed – Blue Origin does not tell if and where the rocket is found. Jeff Bezos wrote in a blog on the test:
“If New Shepard had been a traditional spacecraft, this was a perfect test. But of course one of our goals reuse, and unfortunately the rocket did not return as planned because we lost pressure during the downturn in the hydraulic system. “
” The earth is just our starting point ‘
More exciting still is the ultimate goal of Blue Origin: massive displacement of people into space, so they can finally settling on other planets. Pretty sci so, but the company is serious. Besides images of the rocket launch published a roaring video explaining its ambitions:
“The human need to explore is deeply rooted in us. Expeditions by our ancestors to modern adventures, we live in a unique time when we explore new frontiers. At Blue Origin, we believe that the time has come to make the space accessible to everyone. Because the Earth – in all its beauty – is just our starting point “
Bezos has all his life fascinated by space. The Washington Post found an interview with Bezos in 1982 returned, he was 18 years old student gave to a local newspaper when he graduated with the highest marks. His dream was to build future space hotels, amusement parks space colonies and space for two to three million people. “The whole idea is to preserve the earth,” says the young Bezos.
Tesla founder Elon Musk wants to die on Mars
There are more tech giants fascinated with space. The best known is Elon Musk, CEO of electric car maker Tesla founder and aerospace company SpaceX, which more than Blue Origin publicity are looking at.
Musk wants to develop reusable rockets, so far without success. And Musk will eventually make space travel accessible to everyone so that we can settle on Mars for instance in the case that the Earth would be uninhabitable. Again, this will sound like science fiction to many ears, but he means it. In several interviews Musk has said to want to die on Mars.
Then there are the commercial space company Virgin Galactic Virgin founder Richard Branson, the American Space Adventures and Dutch-American company XCOR. The US space agency NASA, which for years cutbacks, is certainly welcome any space innovation from the commercial angle:
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