Posted on 11/22/2023 6:48:03 PM PST by algore
Elon Musk once branded Jeff Bezos a 'dilettante' of space exploration, but the Blue Origin founder is poised to beat SpaceX to Mars.
NASA announced Wednesday that it will send two scientific spacecraft to the Red Planet aboard the first Blue Origin New Glenn rocket in August 2024 - a contract that costs $20 million.
Musk's SpaceX company was initially set to carry the NASA payload on a Falcon Heavy rocket in October of this year, alongside NASA's Psyche mission, which was bound for an asteroid.
However, the space agency pulled the additional crafts from the launch because the Falcon Heavy would not put them on the proper trajectory to insert them into Mars' orbit.
The new timeline announcement comes shortly after Musk's Starship rocket - the ship he wants to use to ferry crews to the moon and eventually Mars - blew up in a second launch attempt.
An identical pair of spacecraft making up NASA's Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorer (ESCAPADE) mission will hitch a ride on the unproven Blue Origin New Glenn rocket, each carrying three experiments to investigate the effects of solar winds on the planet's magnetosphere.
This launch is part of a broader NASA effort to use private contractors to get to Mars more cheaply.
The US space agency has made a habit of swinging by our planetary neighbor to drop off orbiters, landers, and rovers, most recently in 2020 with the Perseverance rover and Ingenuity helicopter.
NASA's decision is the latest chapter in the billionaire space race between Musk and Bezos, which earlier this year saw each company win separate multibillion-dollar contracts with NASA to go to the moon.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
Assuming I ever retire on mars, I am undecided on which Billionaire I want to be running my HOA
Bezos seems to be 700 years behind Musk at this point. I wonder who he offered a free membership to Amazon Prime?
Good luck. Tell me again about the first successful test flight of the Blue Origin New Glenn rocket?
This is just the Biden regime rewarding one of its faithful donors.
“ This is just the Biden regime rewarding one of its faithful donors.”
EXACTLY!!!
They would rather fail than go with the guy who could actually accomplish the mission since that guy supports free speech.
or punishing a critic.
My money’s on Musk. I don’t know if he’ll get a rocket to Mars before Bezos, but SpaceX clearly has better chops.
Has Bezos even put a rocket in orbit? SpaceX has a successful track record.
Starship will be successful, too, once the wrinkles are ironed out.
It seems like NASA (read fed. govt.) has chosen the low ball bidder…
You’re too late. Sheila Jackson Lee will already be there. After all she knew that the astronauts landed on mars years ago.
The woke idiots at NASA have to send contracts to Blue Orifice now. LOL. Musk, like him or not, is so far ahead of Blue Orifice it’s not even funny.
So let me get this straight.
A: The corrupt, left-leaning US Government hates Elon Musk because he flipped the script on their censorship, among other reasons.
B: NASA, an uber-woke division of the US Government, chose Musk’s competitor Bezos in a supposed engineering competition.
C: Competitor Bezos just happens to own the biggest “news” organization in the government’s capital city.
Where’s the surprise? I’m not convinced the choice of Bezos over Musk had ONE DAMN THING to do with technical prowess, or even business continuity. I think it is politics, pure and simple.
Will free returns apply?
Yep. The Big Guy gets his cut, and Bezos gets the contract.
Nothing to see here folks, move along!
Bezos. New York Jewish banker who seems to think he’s a cowboy.
I’d keep my money in Musk any day of the week in the space race.
How much did this choice have to do with Musk’s politics?
How much did this choice have to do with Musk’s politics?
A $20 million contract for a Mars rocket? That doesn’t buy the lunches or pay the Christmas bonus for the team.
BOTH punishing a critic and rewarding a supporter. Probably also rewarding Bezos for the endless fawning of the WaPo.
“How much did this choice have to do with Musk’s politics?”
pretty sure nothing at all.
I gave a bunch of tech to Bezos to help with his rocket development when I thought he would be the one to be “Space Guy”
unfortunately he is not the one, maybe because the Govt has decided it does not really want this to be a thing, or they are funneling money to Bezos in exchange for AWS access or something.
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