Everything is huge: the shuttle launch pad, the ambitions of the companies and the fortunes of the billionaires backing it.
It’s like “Clash of the Titans”, only instead of Zeus and Hades, it’s Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos and Paypal billionaire Elon Musk.
But without a launch facility, none of the commercial players will be sending rockets anywhere.
Kent’s Blue Origin commercial space company is locked in a battle over a surplus shuttle launch pad from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. With the space shuttle fleet decommissioned, they’ve shut down the gigantic launch pads and are soliciting bids for the commercial use of the launch pad. More that a few high rollers have turned their eyes toward the unique investment.
Blue Origin, incorporated in 2000, is one of several commercial space ventures aimed at providing affordable spaceflight to help develop space. Backed by Bezos, it is in the process of developing a vertical takeoff and vertical landing craft for high atmosphere and orbital use.
Blue Origin uses a launch pad built on land owned by Bezos in rural Texas, but most of the flights conducted at that site are sub-orbital, which do not cross the Kármán line that separates outer space from the Earth’s atmosphere at 62 miles above sea level.
Blue Origin’s biggest competitor for the launch pad comes from Musk’s SpaceX, a well known name in commercial spaceflight. To date, SpaceX has made four successful launches to the International Space Station while Blue Origin is still working to get its ships out of the atmosphere. While blue Origin may have money on its side, SpaceX has proven its capability.
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