Anything you’re able to do , I can do well , is presumably what Jeff Bezos tells Elon Musk every daylight . The former , CEO of Amazon and Blue Origin , showed off his space company ’s Modern reusable rocket at the Satellite 2017 league in Washington today , which it will use to launch planet to place . And , well , it depend remarkably similar to SpaceX ’s Falcon 9 .
The orbital rocket is called New Glenn , first revealed by Blue Origin in September 2016 . So far , Blue Origin has only launched a suborbital fomite call New Shepard onshort hops into space . The recyclable fomite complete a issue of salient launches and landings last year from the troupe ’s trial land site in West Texas .
wait to launch for the first sentence in 2020 , New Glenn will utilize this same reclaimable technology to return its first stage to Earth – just like SpaceX does . In fact , a promotional video released today by the society showing New Glenn ’s capabilities were signally similar to how SpaceX operates , although admittedly there probably are n’t too many ways to launch and land a arugula .
New Glenn will launch as a two or three phase rocket . Once it furcate high above Earth , the upper stages will take its payload into orbit ( the first customer will beEutelsat ) , while the first level will revert to Earth and terra firma . In the picture , this was shown taking place on a hoy , something SpaceX has doneseveral times .
The two companies lock horns in 2012 when Blue Origin test to file a patent for rocket landings on barge . SpaceX countered that they could n’t patent something they were n’t open of doing yet , and the letters patent waseventually canceled . SpaceX then became the first of the two to land on a barge in April 2016 .
New Glenn will be open of taking about 45,000 kilograms ( 100,000 Egyptian pound ) to low - Earth scope and 13,000 kilo ( 29,000 pounds ) to geostationary orbit , about double what SpaceX ’s Falcon 9 can do . But spaceX ’s upcoming Falcon Heavy rocketboasts54,000 kilo ( 119,000 pounds ) to crushed - Earth orbit and 22,200 kilograms ( 49,000 ) to geostationary arena .
Now where have I seen this before … Blue Origin
Last night , Bezos also revealed onTwitterNew Glenn ’s rocket railway locomotive , called Blue Engine 4 ( BE-4 ) . And just last week , Bezos say he eventually wants to start sendingcargo to the Moonto one day support human colonisation there . Musk , for his part , had revealed just day prior a SpaceX plan to sendastronauts around the Moonin 2018 .
Perhaps it ’s a flake unjust to always liken Blue Origin to SpaceX but , well , it ’s severe to refuse the similarities . Two billionaires are spearhead reusable rockets to institutionalize consignment and astronauts to Earth orbit and beyond . Rivalry or not , it ’s only proceed to be good news for blank fans in the coming years .
